Incite Magazine - February 2015

INCITE MAGAZINE

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5 ▪ FEBRUARY 2015 VOLUME 17, ISSUE 4 ▪ DECEMBER 2014

T WO

TWO

onetwothreefourfivesixseveneightni fifteensixteenseventeeneighteennin wentythreetwentyfourtwentyfivetw wentyninethirtythirtyonethirtytwot sixthirtyseventhirtyeightthirtyninefo fourfortyfivefortysixfortysevenfort 04 05 fiftythreefiftyfourfiftyfivefiftysixfifty 06 07 nesixtytwosixtythreesixtyfoursixtyfi v ineseventyseventyoneseventytwo 08 09 fiveseventysixseventysevenseven eeightytwoeightythreeeightyfourei 10 11 yeighteightynineninetyninetyone 12 13 ninetyfiveninetysixninetysevenn onehundredoneonehundredtwoo 14 15 onehundredfiveonehundredsixon 16 17 tonehundrednineonehundredteno veonehundredthirteenonehundred 18 19 fifteenonehundredsixteenonehund nonehundrednineteenonehundred 20 21 hundredtwentytwoonehundredtw 22 23 onehundredtwentyfi veonehundred onehundredtwentyeightonehundre 24 25 hundredthirtyoneonehundredthir 26 27 hundredthirtyfouronehundredthir dredthirtysevenonehundredthirt 28 29 hundredfortyonehundredfortyone issuu.com/incite-magazine facebook.com/incitemagazine @incitemagazine

THE BEST COMBINATION? The Editors

ART: TWINS Véronique Giguère & Jason Lau

SAID THE MINUTE HAND TO THE HOUR HAND Anser Abbas

YOU MAKE QUITE THE PAIR Sunanna Bhasin

THE 2000s Emile Shen

CATS: A HISTORICAL OBSESSION Mary Kate MacDonald

THE ODD ONE OUT Macklin Loosley-Millman

PARADIGMS OF MEMORY Julia Bugiel

THE BLIND DATE Caitlyn Buhay

THE NORTH STAR Anne Goshua

THE LAMP P.V. Maylott

14–02–14 Trisha Philpotts

KISSING HER COFFIN Sarah O’Connor

ART: RIVER ROCKS Mo Brinx

THE LONELY JOURNEY Abena Offeh-Gyimah

WE’RE ALL (STILL) IN IT TOGETHER Nimra Khan

THE WORLD OF VAUDEVILLAINS: 1900=2000 Sean Patrick McCarron

THE PROBLEM IS THE OTHER HALF Dalya Cohen

LAST FRIDAY NIGHT Devra Charney & Kaila Radan

HAPPY 22ND BIRTHDAY! Marlene Malik

MYSTERIOUS LUMPS Olivia Fasullo

I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING SUBSTANTIAL THIS MORNING Rachelle Zalter

DOUBLE LIFE Valerie Cui

TWINNING THE VOTE Shruti Ramesh

ineteneleventwelvethirteenfourteen neteentwentytwentyonetwentytwot I wentysixtwentyseventwentyeighttothirtythreethirtyfourthirtyfivethirty ortyfortyonefortytwofortythreeforty tyeightfortyninefiftyfiftyonefiftytwo 30 31 ysevenfiftyeightfiftyninesixtysixtyo 32 33 vesixtysixsixtysevensixtyeightsixtynoseventythreeseventyfourseventy 34 35 ntyeightseventynineeightyeightyon 36 37 ightyfiveeightysixeightyseveneighteninetytwoninetythreeninetyfour 38 39 ninetyeightninetynineonehundred onehundredthreeonehundredfour40 41 nehundredsevenonehundredeigh42 43 onehundredelevenonehundredtwel dfourteenonehundredonehundred dredseventeenonehundredeightee dtwentyonehundredtwentyoneonewentythreeonehundredtwentyfour dtwentysixonehundredtwentyseven edtwentynineonehundredthirtyone rtytwoonehundredthirtythreeonertyfiveonehundredthirtysixonehuntyeightonehundredthirtynineoneeonehundredfortytwoonehundred ncite Magazine is McMaster University’s student-run monthly publication with a wide range of content, from essay and research pieces to fiction and poetry. Every aspect of Incite’s production is carried out by student volunteers, from content to design to photography to layout. We invite anyone interested in writing or graphics to come to our planning meetings, where we will brainstorm article ideas together and you can sign up to contribute. All skill levels are welcome!

We work to foster close relationships between our contributors and editors. This allows new contributors to collaborate with experienced writers to develop their skills in a friendly and positive environment. Email us at incite@mcmaster.ca to get involved. 

ART Mujda Hakime

YIN & YANG Michele Zaman

DELOS AND THE DOUBLED CUBE Jesse Bettencourt

FEAR IN THE CITY OF LOVE Harry Krahn

NET NEUTRALITY Imran Dhalla

…IS BETTER THAN ONE Patrick de New

READY PLAYER 2 Mackenzie Richardson

RED Gerald Ibe

RETURN TRIP Megan Schlorff

PAIRS Elina Filice

ONE Cathy Huang

CHANCE Nikita Kalsi

EDITORS-IN-CHIEF Sam Godfrey Avery Lam

CREATIVE DIRECTOR Sarah Mae Conrad CONTENT EDITORS Devra Charney Stephen Clare Jaslyn English Kayla Esser Julie-Anne Mendoza Imaiya Ravichandran Louell Taye ART EDITORS Lauren Gorfinkel Jason Lau Angela Ma Sabnam Mahmuda Raluca Topliceanu

WRITERS Anser Abbas, Jesse Bettencourt, Sunanna Bhasin, Julia Bugiel, Caitlyn Buhay, Devra Charney, Dalya Cohen, Valerie Cui, Patrick de New, Imran Dhalla, Olivia Fasullo, Elina Filice, Anna Goshua, Cathy Huang, Gerald Ibe, Nikita Kalsi, Nimra Khan, Harry Krahn, Jason Lau, Macklin Loosley-Millman, Mary Kate MacDonald, Marlene Malik, P.V. Maylott, Sean Patrick McCarron, Sarah O’Connor, Abena Offeh-Gyimah, Trisha Philpotts, Kaila Radan, Shruti Ramesh, Mackenzie Richardson, Megan Schlorff, Emile Shen, Rachelle Zalter, Michele Zaman

I AM NOT Jason Lau

ARTWORK Tasfia Ashan, Mo Brinx, Kandice Buryta, Angela Busse-Gibson, Matt Chau, Sarah Mae Conrad, Ailish Corbett, Kayla Da Silva, Annie Duan, Elina Filice, Leah Olivia Flannigan, Véronique Giguère, Marielle Gordon, Julie Guevara, Mujda Hakime, Tyler Hayward, Sonnet Irwin, Hilary Kee, Hamaeel Khan, Nimra Khan, Jason Lau, Ethan Lin, Jonsson Liu, Angela Ma, Sabnam Mahmuda, Sean Patrick McCarron, Camelia McLeod, Maleeha A. Qazi, Ron Scheffler, Franco Simões, Annie Zhu LAYOUT Catherine Chambers, Sarah Mae Conrad, Lauren Gorfinkel, Julie Guevara, Avery Lam, Angela Ma, Sabnam Mahmuda, Nasreen Mody, Raluca Topliceanu, Elaine Westenhoefer COVERS/TABLE OF CONTENTS Avery Lam

What two things make the best combination?

For me there’s nothing better than pairing a good book with sitting alone on a Friday evening. I love starting off my weekend by wrapping myself in a big fuzzy blanket, turning on my reading lamp, and losing myself in the pages of a classic novel. Sometimes the lively shouts of some drunken revellers will float up from the street and through my window, and I just think to myself how lucky I am to not be included with them and instead be here, alone, surrounded by my Hemingways and Dostoevksys and totally free from any social obligations. I’m free, I think. I don’t have to worry about ‘friends’ or ‘parties’ or ‘conversations’. I don’t have to care for others, only myself. I don’t have to care. And I don’t care!

I’m alone and I’m free and I’m alone. I – I’m so lucky to be here, alone. I’m so lucky. I’m alone. I turn the page with trembling fingers.

I’m alone. The book falls to the floor. They’re still laughing on the street below. Oh God, oh my God, I’m so alone.  Stephen Clare The King and Queen of America, but of course: Jay and Bey.  Imaiya Ravichandran

(Note: the correct answer is Incite Magazine and you, dear reader.)

Me and you, girl. They say the eyes are a window into the soul, and in your eyes I see the Universe. Not just the Universe, but also the past, the future, the present, and the present participle. We’re like PB & J, like gin & juice, like Hall & Oates, like fish & pickles. I don’t care what they say, you and me were meant to be. You know what? Let’s run away together! I don’t have a lot of money, what with my ongoing unemployment and crippling student debt, and it might be touch and go for a while, but as long as we have love, it’ll be worth it, babe. I’ve always said that we’ve gotta hold on to what we’ve got. And, you know, it doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not. Because, we’ve got each other and that’s a lot. For love we’ll give it a shot. So, you ready? Are we gonna do this?! Am I going to take out a mortgage on a new house? Hmm, what’s that? Greg?

Who the hell is – wait, GREG?! ARE YOU SERIOUS? WHAT THE FU— Final answer: alcohol and sorrow.  Louell Taye

The best combination is rain and drinking tea. Or rain and watching Netflix. Or rain and being on a long bus ride somewhere. Or rain and baking. Basically, just rain and anything.

Whilst stalking the Internet, as I make a habit of doing, I stumbled upon a new word: pluvophile. Though a potentially made up Internetism that doesn’t exist in real life, a pluvophile is someone who loves, and seeks comfort from, rainy days. I agree, there are some circumstances where rain is not an ideal condition, but, even when walking outside when its raining, isn’t it made that much better by the fact that you’re going to be home and warm and listening to the rain in your warm little shelter, whatever that happens to be?

Nothing quite puts me at peace like the sound of rain on the rooftops and being free of the pressure to make the most out of another sunny day. (Honourable mention re: best combination: peanut butter and pancakes. Don’t look at me like that, it’s delicious.)  Jaslyn English

4

Take summer, and add music festivals.

It’s warm outside even after the sun goes down, and you get to stand on the grass listening to live bands without worrying about Tuesday’s midterm. Tents, crowds, and merchandise are the usual byproducts.

Warning: never dilute, as this mixture will almost certainly be ruined if watered down with rain.  Devra Charney Did you know there’s an ideal combination of cheeses to put on a pizza that gives the best texture? Food scientists (that’s a real job, guys) at the University of Auckland literally spent weeks mixing different cheeses together and testing them for the perfect balance of elasticity and meltability. The winners were mozzarella and cheddar, but other cheeses such as provolone and edam yielded interesting results. It’s the first of (hopefully) many forays into the creation of an ideal pizza, and I think Plato would be so proud. God bless science.  Kayla Esser

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

Jason Lau + Véronique Giguère Models: Emily & Sophia Kempel

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

5

YOU MAKE QUITE THE PAIR Sunanna Bhasin

ARTWORK BY AILISH CORBETT

I

was about to doze off at any second. The professor’s monotone voice was no longer registering, and the chalkboard full of complex diagrams seemed really far away. I was drifting…

“Hey, is this seat taken?”

An unfamiliar, husky voice interrupted my reverie. Yet when I glanced next to me, I felt I was still dreaming. Geez, when did I become the narrator of a cheesy Harlequin romance novel? The man was still waiting for a response as he gazed at me with the bluest eyes and most blinding smile I had ever seen. I was in some sort of trance.

The professor’s voice became audible again, “Fight or flight. Which do you choose, and what dictates your choice?”

I could see it now – my internal organs having a roundtable discussion on how to respond to this ridiculously attractive man’s question.

Perhaps a stutter? Or maybe no answer at all. Instead, my brain might propel my legs out of the lecture hall so that I could avoid talking altogether.

Flight.

From what I knew of the human body so far, there were two culprits responsible for the trance I was in.

“That’s correct – the nervous and endocrine systems work together. You see, they are a team of sorts. One tells the other what to do, and we notice a change in our physiological behaviour.” My professor’s jargon was really starting to resonate now. Still, my endocrine system wouldn’t blindly follow the orders of my nervous system, right? They are two separate entities, but they work together for my well-being, don’t they? They won’t allow me to fall head-over-heels for a man who… has apparently taken a seat next to me. Oh god, now what?

I could feel sweat seeping from every pore in my body.

I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. It was as if my brain was in overdrive. The slightest contact between us made me catch my breath.



“Why on earth are you making her sweat like that? I may not have any personal experience with relationships, other than the one I’m forced to have with you, but I would not want to sit next to a bucket of sweat.”

“Hey, you released the adrenaline, not me.”

“Yeah, because you told me to! Some nerve you have.”

“So I’ve been told… alright, release the dopamine.”

“Do you always give orders without explanation? You’re supposed to be the logical one.”

“This guy is really attractive. Every time she sees him, she’s going to feel pleasure, maybe have sweaty palms, a little difficulty breathing.”

“That sounds just dandy.”

6

“Drop the sarcastic tone would you? You’ve been acting very hormonal lately.”



Our elbows were touching, and this guy wouldn’t stop smiling at me. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. It was as if my brain was in overdrive. The slightest contact between us made me catch my breath.

I couldn’t focus on the lecture; all I could think about was the mysterious man next to me.

What was going on in my body?



“Serotonin’s really low. She’s going to be as obsessed with this guy as she is with Grey’s Anatomy!”

“Relax! Does somebody need a melatonin?”

“Would you stop mocking me? I’m genuinely concerned here!”

“Nothing to be concerned about – her thoughts are going to be preoccupied with this man, that’s all. She might have trouble focusing in class, but she’ll get over it soon enough. Either that, or she’ll date him. What should we do?”

“How about you exercise your sympathetic side again so I can release the norepinephrine and epinephrine one more time to give her the extra push she needs to talk to this guy?”

“Alright, let’s do it partner.”



I felt a burst of confidence surge through me suddenly. I had to speak to him before class was over. Fight.

“Hey, my name’s Andrea.”

“Jack. See you tomorrow, Andrea. I look forward to it.” He flashed me a smile and winked before leaving the classroom.



I fell into my seat, sighing happily. I could feel fireworks go off within me, and I couldn’t help but smile at the trouble my internal team had gone through to make my words coherent. “You guys make quite the pair,” I thought as I left the lecture hall with a wide grin on my face and a skip in my step.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

artwork by Kayla Da Silva

ď Ž Said the Minute Hand to the Hour Hand Anser Abbas I chased you and you chased me through the earth as it became solid through primordial seas as life began from the droplets I chased you and you chased me I did not know you then.

We did not know what we would become: dividers of the indivisible, markers of beginnings and ends and of everything in between.

I chased you and you chased me together we taught man of patience, of the pain of waiting of urgency, and the difference between memory and hope.

Together we held man between us a hand in each hand as a child learning to walk towards the unknown towards death and what comes beyond, although there we could not follow.

I chased you and you chased me.

Men built their lives around us; gods came and went we saw civilizations climb and crumble glory gained, glory lost we sculpted the shape of the land as much as the oceans did.

I chased you and you chased me.

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

ď Ž

7

the 2000s Emile Shen

T

he turn of the millennium started off with Y2K paranoia. Governments and corporations spent 400 billion dollars to combat adverse effects computer systems would experience during the rollover from 1999 to 2000. As people hoarded non-perishable goods and awaited their doom in bomb-shelters – remnants from the fears of the Cold War – they helped frame the dread that permeated the decade to come.

After a dubious win, George W. Bush started his tumultuous eight-year reign as president. The narrative of Western foreign policy would forever change a week after I started the first grade. I was five when 9/11 happened, and I thank my parents for not censoring the truth from my innocent but inquisitive eyes. I saw the smoke drift from the collapsing buildings, instead of the usual programming of Arthur. I did not know that this would have a ripple effect on all of our lives. I don’t think anyone did. The War on Terror had begun as an attack against religious extremists who threatened Western values of freedom and democracy and, in particular, American interests. Sui-

The turn of the millennium…

cide bombers frequented the news. The faceless group of terrorists being fought against became associated with Islam. Islamophobia spread, no matter how random those airport scans are.

Mother Nature turned her back on us. Even with the advancement of biotechnology, there were many disasters that caused worldwide frenzy. My grandfather refused to let me go see a movie with my friends because of the SARS frenzy. Six years later, swine flu was a similar case – Purell anyone? There was the tsunami in Southeast Asia in 2004, Hurricane Katrina a year later, and the Sichuan earthquake in 2009. Relief concerts like Live Earth brought out the philanthropists in rock stars.

China thrived and grew to be the second largest economy in the world. Greece went bankrupt. Then, the worst economic depression since the 1930s came in 2008 following the burst of a housing bubble and a mortgage crisis. Barack Obama was elected to clean up Bush’s mess just as 8.7 million jobs were lost.

Alas, this is just what Google displays as the main events of the last decade. Global paranoia increased, and for more reasons than one, but surely our experience wasn’t quite so miserable. Fear sells, after all.

Fear sells, after all.

Regardless of how much attention an individual paid to current events, the background noise of the 6 o’clock news was enough to influence our lives in a big way over time. The world was changing as we watched marathons of Lizzie McGuire, waited in line for the newest Harry Potter book, and spent way too much time chatting with our crushes on MSN. It was a decade of tension, polarization and innovation. While as a whole we made great progress in our acceptance of LGBTQ members, in many parts of the world merely living their lives remained punishable by death. It is questionable which of the Millennium Development Goals were being achieved and which were stagnating.

The Internet became a piece of irreplaceable technology, with social media websites galore – MySpace, Friendster, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter – coming and going, but always connecting us. Apple became the pinnacle of technological prowess, from the iPod to the game-changing iPhone.

So, what does all this mean for the millennials? The so-called 90s kids that grew up through the negativity and paranoia propagated by the news media?

Firstly, we have few jobs available. We don’t care about home ownership or cars like the generation before us. We are restless and anxious about the state of the union and of humanity’s continued existence. Perhaps this translates to other generations as selfishness or recklessness. But it is difficult to live in a world that is degenerating 8

If you aren’t outraged, then you aren’t really paying attention.

before our eyes. If you aren’t outraged, then you aren’t really paying attention.

At the same time, we care. It’s not accurate to generalize about anything, which, admittedly, is what this article has been doing thus far. But, the people I surround myself with are genuine in their desire to save the world. My friend tells me of the melting ice caps that will inevitably flood the largest cities in the world – from London to Shanghai to New Orleans. Inevitably, this, or nuclear warfare, or maybe something that is unfathomable at the moment, will end civilization as we know it. So, with all these fears, it makes me wonder why we spend the wee hours of the morning studying for the motions of fluids in physics, when we should be spending them in the arms of someone we love. What is the point?

Well, it is a blunted one, but my friend tells me that the point of university is not the piece of paper with our degree and name written in a fancy font, at the end of this. The point is to use the enlightenment and knowledge we’re receiving from the university experience to save the world.

RIP 2000–2009. If not much else, you were memorable.

P.S. Thanks for bringing us Snuggies.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

cats

A Historical Obsession Mary Kate MacDonald

I

“Four legs good, two legs bad”… cats are becoming more and more recognized for their ultimate superiority over all other pets.

can only imagine that when George Orwell wrote “Four legs good, two legs bad” in Animal Farm, he was referring to cats. With their adorable demeanor and appearance only augmented by their sass and zealous curiosity, cats are becoming more and more recognized for their ultimate superiority over all other pets. As an increasing number of people are getting lost in the Internet’s endless supply of cat photos, it is safe to say that kittens and cats are captivating the minds and hearts of our generation.

Trends like Lolcats, Grumpy Cat, and other cat memes may make it seem like cats are only using the Internet to share their glory with as many humans as possible. Yet this movement is not unique to Internet fandoms; cat photography and memes date back to the 1870s. This pivotal period in feline domination occurred not even a decade after Richard Leach Maddox invented the gelatin dry plate silver bromide process, allowing people to take pictures and develop them immediately after. Thus, after photography was made readily accessible, you can see that humanity’s first instinct was to photograph cats.

The pioneer of the cat photography industry was Harry Pointer of England.

For years Pointer shot naturalistic photos of cats drinking milk, sleeping, and playing with yarn. But as 1870 rolled around, Pointer had an idea that would revolutionize man’s approach to cat photography. He decided to take pictures of cats in bizarre poses and attire, including drinking tea, roller-skating, and taking ‘selfies’.

His photographs were a huge success, but it was the addition of phrases and descriptions to them that prompted his business to take off. By 1884 his collection, called “The Brighton Cats”, comprised

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

Frees’s time it was seen as pragmatic. As Frees put it, working with live animals, especially when they were in costumes and unusual settings, took “an almost inof over 200 of these goofy olden day cat conceivable amount of memes. The photos were sold as greeting patience, care, and kind cards and postcards, turning Mr. Pointer attention, as well as a very into a very wealthy man. large number of spoiled Although cat photography didn’t take films.” off in North America until decades later, the Frees did try to creative and unusual approaches of Amerexpand his portfolio ican photographer, Harry Whittier Frees, to include other anicaused the cat craze to reach even greatmals, but ultimately it was cats that were er heights. The photo that sparked Frees’s his favourite models. Frees tried photo career and the American cat photography shoots with rabbits, puppies, and pigs, but industry was of a cat in a birthday hat in the kittens’ versatility and ease of person1905. This photo was taken at Frees’s own ification proved them most appealing. birthday party.

Some believe that it is the ease Much like Pointer, Frees made a of projecting human emotion and very lucrative career out of the pubexperience onto cats, as opposed to lication of his cat pictures in greetother animals, that has allowed this ing card, posters, and calendars. cat obsession to persist for so many Frees’s business, however, was years, but others say that it is their more of a family affair, as his adorable ways that have captivated mother was a seamstress and the world. made all the tiny aprons, paWhile it would be idejamas, jackets and hats al to always have a cat that the adorable kitwithin reach to cudtens donned in his dle, that is not pospictures. sible for everyone.

Unlike his We have to resort predecessor, to the Internet Frees used and the cat phodead cats tography industry. that were Pointer and Frees, p ro p p e d although they may up with have used quescord and tionable means, had wires to good intentions – to form the ARTWORK BY ANNIE DUAN bring the joy of cats to perfect the masses.  scene. While this strategy may seem unethical and frankly quite disturbing, during 9

THE ODD ONE OUT Macklin Loosley-Millman

I

am sitting down for lunch with a group of four other people, meeting for a presentation. At some point we break off into pairs. Person A is talking to B, and C is talking to D, and E (me) is sitting, listening, trying to dive into one of the conversations.

Throughout my life, a party, a meeting, a something, has always made me feel left out. Now this could be because I tend to be more anti-social and silent in large groups, especially the group is of people who I don’t know, but mostly it is because there are an odd number of people. The saying, “Two’s company but three’s a crowd” is relevant to many, if not all, social situations. Therefore, in an odd numbered situation, there is the unfortunate opportunity for someone to be the odd one out. I would like to present two cases of this found in literature, past and present.

The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling and Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen are both famous literary works that centre on groups composed of an odd number of people. These groups lead to the exclusion

of at least one member (this may contain spoilers for those who have not read the books).

Harry, Ron and Hermione are the main trio of friends in Harry Potter. Throughout the course of the series, I feel that each of the three feels left out at one point or another. For instance, they meet during their first year of school, but not at the same time. Hermione is not part of the group until the middle of the book, when

“Two’s company but three’s a crowd” is relevant to many, if not all, social situations.

Harry and Ron rescue her from a troll. Before that, Harry and Ron had been friends since meeting on the train to Hogwarts. Hermione is autoARTWORK BY NIMRA KHAN matically the odd one out, for being a girl and being the last to join the group. But as I said before, each have their moments of feeling left out. For example, in the third book, Harry and Hermione have a time travel adventure while Ron stays in the infirmary. Two examples of when Harry is left out are when he finds out he can speak Parseltongue and when he is called the Chosen One. Let’s look at a classical example that involves family instead of friends: the Bennet sisters. They are – from oldest to youngest – Jane, Elizabeth (Lizzy), Mary, Catherine (Kitty) and Lydia from Pride and Prejudice. There is only one ‘odd one out’ in this example, and she is Mary, the middle child. It is from her father’s perspective that each

10

girl is described. The two eldest – Jane and Elizabeth – he considers the most sensible, and Elizabeth, his favourite, he deems clever. They are also the most beautiful of the sisters, who are all known for being the beauties of the neighbourhood. The youngest two – Kitty and Lydia – are of a similarly cheerful, if somewhat flighty, disposition.

This leaves Mary as the odd one out. Mary is the only plain Bennet sister. She devotes herself to study and is mentioned to be the most accomplished lady in the neighborhood. She is also very dull, conceited, and has no taste, which makes her a less than ideal companion. However, I feel that is because she does not have anyone to talk to and is constantly overlooked by her parents. Mary craves attention, but is sadly stuck to listening to everyone else instead.

There are many more examples of the complications of odd numbers in literature, for they add tension and drama, especially in the famous love triangles that currently seem to be dominating fiction. Sometimes I just want to reach in and pull that left out character from the pages and be the one to keep them company… and that’s when I realize that I really should stop reading so much and find an odd group of friends to make even.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

ARTWORK BY SABNAM MAHMUDA

Paradigms of Human Memory Julia Bugiel

M

y mind is like a sieve. My life is a list of books read only to have the subtleties of their plots forgotten; a jumble of names interchanged and wrongly assigned; a series of tasks to do that wastes away in the recesses of my mind.

I leave in my wake a trail of lost belongings and words that disappear from the tip of my tongue.

Perhaps because of this deficit, I have always loved the feeling of déjà vu. I walk into a room and am certain I have been there before, that I have lived this exact moment. There exists a truth to explain the phenomenon, but its substance evades my conscious mind, and so I grasp blindly at its boundaries.

Just as most people rarely remember the details of their situations themselves later, I have but one real memory of déjà vu. The weathered husk of the day, the four p.m. commute, saw my friend and I on a crowded subway car. Stopping and starting in a familiar rhythm, the train took us back to Toronto’s west end. As it hummed through the underground tunnels, swaying slightly, we talked to each other about the minutiae of our lives. Then suddenly, a feeling so difficult to describe. So fuzzy and abstract, of vital importance to no one other than myself. As I tried to put into words what had happened, I was surprised when the woman sitting in front of us spoke.

A subway scientist, common prophet, or helpful stranger, I know not which, but she told me that déjà vu was nothing more than a glitch in my brain. “You process an event twice instead of once, in such quick suc-

cession that you don’t notice it happening.

Instead you just have a sense of familiarity without recollecting why or how.”

Just like that, one of life’s great mysteries was neatly packaged and handed back to me. The thing is, déjà vu is quite a contested concept. In The Déjà Vu Experience, Alan Brown describes several hypotheses.

In one, two interrelated brain functions operate separately, granting a situation a feeling of familiarity without any actual recognition taking place. Alternatively, it could be a

potheses, there is hard evidence to support the scientific approach. I tend to hold two explanations in my mind, as if on opposite sides of some internal scale. On the one hand, there are theories and variants and an ever-changing body of knowledge in subscription to higher principles of science. On the other, there is the inexplicable truth of my perception. Logically I cannot believe them both, but I do. I love the idea that déjà vu is some brain quirk, a reminder of how our physiology controls us. I love it because the creative genius of scientific theories matches the poetry of the unknown.

This proof in the hold that neuroscience and psychology have over us, I take it and accept it and love to learn about it. At the same time, when it happens, I perceive it as the mystery of human knowledge, as something on another plane of existence, out of our reach. I hold these two truths in my hands. Is it so wrong to love science and yet craft a narrative of higher power?

Déjà vu is a commonplace but nonetheless striking reminder of both scientific progress and human smallness.

Every insight I gain, I will lose. Every moment, I will forget. Every new word I learn, I will struggle to remember, not so far in the future. Through these mental oddities, through these processes of remembrance and forgetting, our bodies endow us with a predisposition for bafflement and wonder.

Thus, although it frustrates me, I almost exalt in déjà vu. But don’t take my word for it. Everything I now feel about déjà vu, I will probably forget. My mind is like a sieve – but then, you’ve heard that before. 

I walk into a room and am certain I have been there before, that I have lived this exact moment.

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

brain glitch of some sort, whether a seizure or a delay. Some psychologists describe it as experiencing a scene, the fundamentals of which you have actually encountered before, whether the cadence of a voice or the layout of a street. In this theory, sometimes media expose us to places and people vicariously, leaving a ghostly impression on us. Finally, it very well could be that we perceive a situation twice. Our brain falters in its first attempt as it is interrupted, only to try again anew, leaving us feeling an indescribable recognition.

Despite the differences between hy-

11

ARTWORK BY CAMELIA MCLEOD

THE BLIND DATE Caitlyn Buhay

E

very little girl dreams of her prince.

Someone who will sweep her off her feet but not make her sweep her room. You hope he will look like Eric from The Little Mermaid and also that he will own

at the table. Maybe I shouldn’t have gotten there a half hour late, but to be fair, I was doing what all normal people do before a date – Skyping all your contacts to tell them to look for your face on the news tomorrow. I could have been a bit more selective with my calls, of course. My Aunt Sharon told me to wear something half decent in case they do find my body.

I get to the table and start the usual small talk. I start thinking I can touch the awkwardness in the air. I don’t realize I have actually been groping the air subconsciously. My date is now starting to look like he wants to bolt. I try to compose myself and decide that now is a good time to show off my napkin folding skills to keep my hands from fondling the air again. As I artfully fold my paper plane, my date

I start thinking I can touch the awkwardness in the air. a cute sheep dog that never sheds to save you from your tragic allergies. Then we grow up and look around for our prince. We go on a few dates with boys that look like Prince Eric’s creepy younger brother with a concerning interest in samurai swords. We start to lose hope, and that’s when it happens: the blind date. Sure, I tell myself, you may be going out with a potential American psycho, but it has to be better than the last guy that brought his mom on the second date.

Hopefully?

I get ready and head out to the restaurant. When I get there, my date is waiting

12

seems, if not impressed, mildly amused.

Encouraged, I attempt to take my chances and throw the plane into an impressive arc.

The plane immediately falls into the next table’s tea light, catching on fire.

After the waiter has extinguished the fire we are politely asked to leave the restaurant and not come back. At least as a small bonus, they forget to bring us the cheque, which saves us from the awkward ‘who pays on the first date’ dilemma. Crisis averted.

I wait for my date to offer to walk me home. Instead, he gives me a shaky handshake and tells me he has had an interesting evening. As he speed walks away, I contemplate trying blind dates more often. At least guys end up thinking you’re interesting! 

As he speed walks away, I contemplate trying blind dates more often.

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

THE NORTH STAR Anna Goshua

T

he desert is eternal.

I squint, shielding my eyes from the blazing sun that sets the endless expanse of sand alight. Beads of sweat gather at my temples. I fumble for my water bottle, already feeling parched. It is nearly empty.

The sand is heavy under my boots, dragging me downward as I walk. I resist, wrenching my feet out to place them one in front of the other, over and over again. I feel as though I am barely moving; my legs ache. But the plane wreckage gradually disappears behind me.

Perhaps I should have stayed at the site of the crash. I am engulfed by nothingness now, and the silence weighs on me. I think of you.

Running carelessly through the streets with you, fingers intertwined. Playing games of tag, adventuring through the forests and mountainside, always consumed in a world of our own creation.

“I’ll see you soon, brother!” I remember you saying excitedly over the phone. I grit my teeth.

“I will make it out of here,” I say, my voice hoarse from thirst and barely audible.

No one is there to hear me, but I am convinced that you do. You always do.

Night falls.

“Shelter,” I whisper, teeth chattering as vicious winds claw at me. The air is frigid; the grains of sand feel like pellets of ice.

“And wa… water…”

I stumble along a few more feet before my knees buckle. My arms reach out of their own will, catching my fall, bracing me as I remain motionless on the ground, taking deep

breaths of air that hurt my chest. Sand caresses my hands, the grit sliding over my palms, between my fingers, underneath my fingernails. I clutch at it, but it slithers out of my grip.

I’m alone. Fear pounds through my veins, rendering me acutely aware of the wasteland consuming me. I close my eyes and push myself onto my haunches, tilting my head back and shouting angrily at the skies. I feel dizzy, and every word tears at my dry throat, but I can’t stop the nonsensical babble pouring out of me.

I’m lost, alone and lost in this godforsaken desert, alone and lost and dying of thirst and I have no idea what to do and I promised you that I’d be there with you today or yesterday or a month ago, I don’t have a damn clue how long it’s been, time passes but it doesn’t pass here, not here where everything’s the same and everything’s killing me God help me…

A dry sob heaves my chest, and the wild flow of thoughts gradually quiets. The wind has let down, offering me a few moments of reprieve.

I open my sore eyes. The soft glow of the stars that dot the sky is somewhat soothing. I remember your fascination with astronomy. I start counting them idly… one, two, three… five… seven…

“Take a look at Ursa Major!” Your voice comes alive through an old memory. Springtime. Mountain hiking. You standing near the cliff’s edge pointing upward, a smile on your face.

“Is it one of those constellations?” I ask.

“Of course,” You exclaim. “Listen, it’s

pretty easy to spot them once you get the hang of it. Try looking for the Big Dipper.”

You take my hand and direct it upward. “See those seven bright stars? Kinda ploughshaped? You can use the last two stars of the Big Dipper as pointers to find a bunch of things. Like Polaris,” You gesture directly south of the pointer stars, “It always points north, so you can never truly be lost, see?”

I see it.

It’s a beacon amidst the dull glow of the other stars, shining like the sun. Its light grows brighter and brighter, nearly blinding me. I shield my eyes and cautiously push myself to my feet. I walk forward, looking skyward regularly.

I think that I lose sight of it, and panic surges through me. I come to a halt and revolve in one place until I finally locate it again. I stretch out my hand. It’s safe.

Daylight.

I gasp as I see a cityscape looming beyond the dunes close by. I break into a shaky run, drawing on nothing but the conviction that you’re there. Still, my pace falters. The city’s boundary approaches; a cobblestone path lined with palm trees beckons me. I fall across it, landing heavily on my stomach.

“I’m here, brother, I’ve made it,” I whisper. Panting, I rest my head, taking comfort in the warmness of the ground. Glancing northward, I notice the faint glow of starlight. I hear footsteps approaching from that direction. My eyelids flutter.

Familiar fingers grasp my hand; I smile, squeezing back weakly. And then everything goes dark. 

ARTWORK BY ANNIE ZHU

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

13

THE LAMP P.V. Maylott

T

he top stair groans under Daddy’s weight. He creeps down the hallway toward his bedroom, trying not to wake me up.

I won’t sleep. Daddy’s shadow disappears. His bedroom door creaks open.

Anxiously, I wait in my dark room, waiting for Daddy to close his door, listening as the scratching thing creeps closer to my bed.

My trembling hand waits on the lamp switch. I can’t twist it on until the door closes – Daddy will make me turn it off. He gets angry when the lights are on at night. He said we can’t afford another nightlight right now, even if he’s the one that kicked the last one.

He doesn’t believe in the scratching thing because he can’t see it.

Neither can I, but I hear it coming for me when he goes to bed now that the nightlight is gone.

My heartbeat surges blood behind my eyes. I strain with pulsating vision and try to see the impossibly invisible thing that creeps in the darkness.

I whimper nasally. The scratching thing giggles.

The thing is very quiet, but I hear it. It pretends to be a little kid, but I know it’s not. Little kids don’t scratch around and giggle in the dark. I hate when it giggles because that means it’s close.

If Daddy doesn’t close the door, I’m going to scream. Daddy will get mad, but at least I’ll be safe. From down the hall, a door latch clacks into place.

I twist on the lamp.

I see its foot slip into the shadows. It skitters away faster than the light can find the spot where my eyes are already fixed – the spot where I thought it was. The lamp is enough to keep it away. I’m safe for now.

My blood turns to ice as I lock eyes with my grainy reflection which gazes back at me from the closet mirror. I smear the sweat from my upper lip onto my pyjama sleeve and search the dark for the scratching thing.

It could be under the bed or in the dark corners of the room. I think it went back into the closet. The closet is closed. I’m probably safe.

A whispery sound comes from an inky corner of my room. It wasn’t a scratch and it wasn’t a giggle. It might be the cat. But what if it’s not? The cat keeps it away, but Daddy sometimes brings it into the bedroom. I hope it’s the cat.

“Kitty?” I whisper as loudly as I dare.

“Lights out. Go to sleep!” Daddy’s muffled frustration bellows

from behind a closed door. He must be able to see my lamp light. My fingertip reluctantly rests upon the grooved knob, dreading the darkness, unable to force myself to give up my safety. Maybe Daddy will just go back to sleep.

Maybe Daddy is right – maybe it’s all in my head. I hear ominous bedsprings creak. I reflexively twist off the lamp.

The room is swallowed in darkness. Daddy stops moving.

I whimper. It scratches.

My sweaty hand quivers on the lamp switch, waiting for Daddy to lie down. He’ll go to sleep and I’ll be able to leave the light on. I promise myself that I won’t call for the cat this time.

I strain to see how close it is. It giggles in the darkness and scuttles closer.

Springs groan as Daddy lies back down. I twist on the lamp.

The dim light scares away the darkness. My frantic gaze dashes around the room, searching for a sign of the scratching thing. My closet is closed, but something seems out of place.

There’s something wrong with the mirror. It can’t be real.

My reflection is missing.

I open my mouth to scream, but nothing comes out.

Something scratches by my bed.

The lamp light blinks out.

I try to twist on the lamp – it doesn’t work. It giggles.

The room is dark.

I press against the wall. The scratching thing climbs onto my bed with me.

It has my face.

“I unplugged the lamp,” it giggles. 

ARTWORK BY SARAH MAE CONRAD

14

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

ARTWORK BY SONNET IRWIN

14–02–14 Trisha Philpotts

K

enna perched on the window seat overlooking the lively Yorkville Street.

She sipped slowly on a bourbon mix, not because she liked the taste but because it reminded her of home. On any given Sunday her father could be found behind the desk in his study sipping on bourbon and reading the Golf Quarterly he’d picked up at the country club. Every now and then Kenna’s eyes would abandon the street in order to steal glances at Robert, who was pounding away on his keyboard finishing up the second draft of the manuscript he’d been working on for months.

Kenna’s parents were on their way to pick her up. Today was the day she would leave Robert for good. The only hiccup was that her parents were no more than twenty minutes away by now and she’d yet to break the news to Robert.

Robert wasn’t a bourbon man like Kenna’s father; in fact Robert rarely drank at all beyond a social sip of absinthe when in the company of his literary peers. Kenna’s father said you couldn’t trust a man who didn’t drink – he said it unbalanced the playing field as the sober man in the room remained privy to all drunken secrets.

Kenna’s father, George, was a wealthy man who came from a wealthy family generations removed from their humble beginnings. Neither George nor his parents had to work for their fortune or the Ivy League education it afforded them. Robert, on the other hand, was well off but nowhere near the Brewsters’ myriad of wealth. His first two novels greeted him with reasonable prosperity and acclaim, making him a

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

household name around Toronto. “Fleeting” is what George called Robert’s money and exaltation. George Brewster’s daughter deserved a man with a history of stability, not a bum with an undergraduate degree in creative writing who fell into some luck.

“Creative writing with a focus in contemporary fiction” is how Robert proudly explained it when George grilled him about his education during their first meeting. Kenna’s mother, Helen, scoffed at the idea. “What is a man to do in the real word with an education that takes place in fictional worlds?” she’d asked. Kenna resented the way her parents spoke of Robert as though he were hired help as opposed to the love of her life.

At the time, Kenna had deeply romanticized the idea of marrying a writer; after all, Zelda Fitzgerald’s life sounded so enchanting.

In the rebellious phase that all twenty-somethings go through, Kenna convinced Robert to elope. Robert was a simple man, but he made it a point of his duty to financially support Kenna the way her father did. Robert knew that Kenna was used to things he couldn’t afford, but his pride wouldn’t allow a penny of George’s condescending money into their house. So, with every advance Robert would get on his books he would allow Kenna to splurge on the designer things she yearned for. This made Kenna happy, and Robert was happy to see her happy.  “Robby, can we talk for a minute?”

Kenna asked hesitantly.

“Can it wait Kens? I’m working,” Robert replied, barely looking up from the com-

puter screen. Somewhere within his quiet resolve Robert resented Kenna. Robert used to love writing and strongly believed that literature was art and not consumerism.

However, since meeting Kenna he found himself meeting deadlines and churning out half-hearted novels just to afford his wife her lifestyle.

She made him hate his first love, and for that he hated his second.

“You’re always working,” Kenna said, air quotations hanging around the word ‘working.’

“That’s where all your nice things come from, Kens… I work,” Robert said.

“Nice things?” Kenna asked, laughing incredulously at the jab.

Kenna crossed the room and rummaged through her purse. Robert looked up from the screen, puzzled. Kenna’s hands, buried deep within the designer purse, resurfaced with a small booklet in hand. She ripped out one of its pages, crumpled it into a ball and threw it at Robert. The ball bounced off of his forehead and fell to his feet. Robert unravelled the leaflet and saw that it was a cheque; the signature line was signed “George Brewster” but the dollar amount was left blank.

Robert looked up at Kenna sullenly, his emotions were somewhere between heartbroken and betrayed. Kenna flipped through the pages of the booklet slowly and deliberately, revealing several more signed blank cheques.

“Darling,” Kenna began, looking at Robert pitifully, “let’s not kid ourselves; you don’t buy me nice things.”  15

Kissing Her Coffin Sarah O’Connor

M

y first thought when kissing my mom’s coffin was how many other people had kissed it before me.

It was a rental coffin. Don’t start thinking that means my family is cheap when it comes to our loved ones: it just made logical sense. She was being cremated; the coffin was needed strictly for the visitation and funeral mass. There was no point paying for a new coffin that would barely be used. So we got a rented coffin, and when I kissed its smooth brown surface, my lips left an imprint that stayed for a few seconds before disappearing, and I wondered how many other times this coffin had been kissed and for whom.

Was it a husband saying goodbye to his wife, like my dad? Was it a brother saying goodbye to his sister, or vice versa? It was probably a grandparent, since coffins and death should be reserved for the elderly, but the world just doesn’t work like that. Or maybe it was daughter saying goodbye to her mother, like my sister and I. On January 4, 2015 my mom died: Happy New Year to me.

It was inflammatory breast cancer, which is a rare and torturous form of cancer that appears on the outside of the breast, at first looking like a dainty pink rash before it explodes, turning red and inverting the nipples, eating away at the breast until there are holes, and blood and puss are leaking out. You can actually see what the cancer’s doing, and when you see the horror it’s causing on the outside of the breast, you can easily imagine what it’s doing on the inside.

My mom was first diagnosed with plain old ordinary breast cancer ten years ago,

and we thought it was simple. Just a tiny little tumour that didn’t even need chemo, just surgery and a few radiation treatments, and, voilà, cured, or so we hoped. She was in remission for eight years and was diagnosed again when I started university.

That second cancer was really a few cells from the first cancer, like an assassin waiting to strike. It gave her three more tumours, and she was forced to take chemo, radiation, and another surgery. She was given a few months of remission, of peace, until February 2014, when the cancer turned

important? Just chop off my breasts and scoop out my uterus. There, one less thing to worry about.

But I’m a coward.

It isn’t the whole “not being able to have children” thing. Or maybe it is. I don’t know. More so, I think about how, without these organs, I wouldn’t even be a woman because what is a woman without breasts and a uterus? From the childhood gifts of baby dolls to the never-ending questions of baby names and how many future children I want, I have been conditioned to motherhood. I have been taught that to be a woman is to be a mother, but I don’t even know if I want to be a mother. Will being a mother kill me?

Without my lady parts, I would be this thing mimicking womanhood, mocking womanhood. It wouldn’t matter that I would still call myself a woman; it would be a lie. Those parts that are so valued by society that some women would kill to have a child, and I am willing to give them up to save myself. These are not life-giving organs as society dictates. They are a threat, and they are a death trap, at least to me.

I am too young to be thinking this way.

But the longer I wait, the more of a threat my body becomes. Tick tock, tick tock, not a biological countdown, but a biological explosion. What to do, what to do.

I don’t know.

I thought all this while kissing my mom’s coffin, and I think it now. I wonder what the other people whose lips have touched this coffin were thinking. I wonder about the future kissers and what their thoughts will be.

Did another girl kissing this coffin, kissing her mother goodbye, think these very same thoughts? Did she think of me? 

I wondered how many other times this coffin had been kissed and for whom.

16

into inflammatory breast cancer. I’ve already told you what that was like.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my breasts lately. Many months before my mom died, she advised my sister and I that, after we had our children (however many years that was into the future), we should get a mastectomy and a hysterectomy because the women in her family produced a lot of estrogen, and that was how she had gotten the cancer and etc. and etc.

Mother-daughter conversations.

I’d rather just get it done and over with now though. There are other ways to have children, and is breast feeding really that

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

Mo Brinx

(2015)

A strong curiosity of the surface textures of trivial objects inspires me to create photorealistic and abstract pastel drawings. Some drawings, although hyperrealistic, can appear flat with nonrepresentational qualities. I am interested in looking at the surfaces of objects such as river rocks and separating what I see into layers of marks and shades of colour. To see videos of my work visit my YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/mobrinx. ď Ž

33"Ă—22", chalk pastel on paper.

River Rocks (No two are the same)

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

17

THE LONELY JOURNEY Abena Offeh-Gyimah

I

must admit that the first year in a PhD program is stressful, demanding, and, at times, can leave a doctoral student feeling barely competent. The difficult task of balancing coursework, applying for scholarships/grants/conferences, and teaching/ research responsibilities shifted my focus away from the people I care about most.

Nowadays, I struggle to have a conversation without worrying about my readings or deadlines. To be honest, I am addicted to feeling productive.

The graduate student journey varies.

Some experience a terrible first year: unable to find the right supervisor, insufficient funding, the department or program feels like a mistake or their personal life is incompatible with the intense demands. Conversely, others enjoy a terrific first year! Regardless of the difference in experience, the journey in graduate school is often a lonely one.

Recently, I have been thinking about the significance of companionship during the graduate journey, and, more so, how we choose to make time for family, friends, a partner, and those we meet along the way.

This might sound simple, but it becomes

easy to dismiss spending time with those we care about when the realities of graduate school hits. In my first semester, I was swamped with impossible deadlines and unrealistic short-term goals. I began to think the university sent the admission letter to the wrong individual, and that I was an imposter who did not belong in academia. I caught myself pretending I was well versed in epistemology and methodology to impress my peers. This lonely journey is also an anxious one.

I did not have an ‘ah ha’ moment, but through a series of conversations with older PhD students, I realized that the doctoral program is a process, not just an end goal.

Thus, purposely making time for things in my life other than scholarly journals and books is critical to my wellbeing. I started by making a commitment to spend time with my parents, mostly on Saturday evenings. These visits almost always involve delicious (and nutritious) home cooking – a resource in scarce supply to grad students everywhere! These visits keep me grounded.

Also, I became very distant from close friends during the first semester of my pro-

gram. I used my nine-hour study schedule as an excuse not to hang out. Articulating the guilt I experienced when enjoying a poetry slam instead of doing my readings made me anxious. However, seeing close friends reminded me of how valuable my life outside academia was. But, the struggle was balancing a serious relationship; dinner dates became study dates, hurrying through visits to get back to writing a paper, and compromising each other’s feelings with promises. I knew that losing a supportive partner would have been difficult to deal with, and so, I had to rethink what this journey meant to me in the bigger picture.

The key is purposely reserving time to spend with the people we care deeply for.

This can be extremely beneficial to the mental, emotional, and intellectual health of any student. What I know for sure is that deliberately setting time aside to spend with others in this lonely journey can be lifesaving. I heard someone from the School of Graduate Studies say, “In graduate school, there are always so many things you were supposed to do yesterday.” This will always be the case, and so today, I choose my well-being. 

ARTWORK BY MATT CHAU

I realized that the doctoral program is a process, not just an end goal.

18

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

WE’RE ALL (STILL) IN IT TOGETHER Nimra Khan

C

hange is like eating green eggs and ham. It can be interesting, exciting, something you have to move towards eventually. But at the same time, it’s scary, strange, and puts knots in your stomach. Maybe you’ll like it, but you could also hate it. Welcome to the second year of my undergrad, more commonly known as the ‘sophomore slump’.

I’ve been combing through my experience so far and realizing that, in some ways, it’s been scarier than first year. In first year, there is more of a push to support undergrads’ transitions into university life. “We’re all in it together,” and moving into residence feels positive and exciting. It also felt like first year had more of a goal. With everyone in the same boat of this new experience, the challenge was to survive. Like little fish in a big pond, we had to push our way to the top, we tried to understand the system and new courses in order to get great GPAs. If I could just survive first year, I was told, the rest of my undergrad would be much better. I imagined a wondrous place where I felt confident in my decisions and would finally know where I was going.

However, change was not quite so kind this time around. First, the commute: in my first year, I became accustomed to living in residence. This year, however, I started commuting. The GO bus really is one of my best friends now, as I’m sure many commuters will tell you. Many people will say that the thirty-minute bus ride home isn’t that bad of a commute. And they’re right – the commute itself isn’t so bad, but quite honestly, I hate it. Working out how I’ll get to school each day just gives me more to be anxious about.

Secondly, what is my goal this year? I suppose it is the same as it’s always been, which is a high GPA! If I survive this year – wait a second. That mentality doesn’t quite work this time. I’ve already survived, and now I just need to keep swimming, but to where, exactly? It’s the pressure of this big ocean I’ve suddenly jumped into. The elusive VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

big picture with family or friends. Second: future still hasn’t arrived, but I already need Stop trying to be in control and assuming to make decisions about my career. Even that everyone else is in control. Everyone is though people might say that your program doing different things, and you don’t have to is flexible, a decision will have to be made. compare yourself to others in order to judge Upper-year courses pack new punches with your success. Lastly: Don’t work towards more work, meaning less free time if you ‘happiness’. It’s not a destination, but rather don’t plan things just right. Courses aren’t a state of being. There will be downfalls and shiny and new anymore, so everything feels good moments, but you’ll miss the good a little stale. And finally, with no one talking things when you’re stuck thinking, “I’ll be about the hurdles to jump through this year, happy only if I reach a destination.”  the fear of the unknown becomes my worst enemy.

I also have my ARTWORK BY LEAH OLIVIA FLANNIGAN own personal struggles that I don’t really tell anyone about, but I wish sophomores had more of a support system, like in first year. It would be nice to not leave this as the elephant in the room. The clear-cut path ends after first year, and while there are people who find the clearing hidden away in forest, most of us are stuck feeling the claustrophobia of this change.

I’ll leave you with a few things I’ve come to realize on especially stressful days.

First: Spend time with others, not thinking about work. A lot of times, I don’t even realize how much I’m unconsciously working through my to-do list, thinking about how to get my life together, when I could be spending that time just enjoying the moment and seeing the 19

The World of

1900=2000

S

pace comes at a premium. Since the 1960s, engineers working in the nascent science of computers opted to conserve memory – and by extension, money – by encoding years with just two digits instead of four. In other words, today’s date would be written as 01-30-15 instead of 01-30-2015.

The problem, of course, is that those first two digits are awfully important – without them, there’s no way to determine whether the year refers to 2015 or 1915.

For the computer, there’s really no difference. This is the crux of what was known as the Y2K bug. By 1999, this was a big problem, and an even bigger industry.

Today, few people seem to agree whether the Y2K threat was ever real, let alone if it really would have led to our computers eating us and driving high-speed commuter trains into the sea, but this apocalyptic vision of the new millennium was very real at the time.

Forward thinkers at the dawn of the 20th century often looked ahead to what the year 2000 might hold. What amuses me about these images, commonly printed in magazines or on postcards to appeal to public curiosity, is not so much what they got wrong, but how much they actually got right. The method is usually incorrect, but the idea is there. Sure, we aren’t still wearing top-hats and long tailcoats, nor are we grinding books into a machine that reduces words on a page into an electric signal shot directly into our brains, but it’s not really so far off. We listen to audiobooks, read eBooks, and learn from YouTube tutorials.

Were they really wrong?

What’s most pervasive in all of these images is the fascination or concern with the prospect of a wholly automated society. We find the concept of a robotic tailor fitting you for a new suit to be patently absurd, but we’re all waiting for Google’s driverless car to come out so we can finally take naps on our commute to work.

I think this is why the Y2K bug is so interesting.

Like an Asimov novel, we stood at the cusp of a new millennium, and the automated world we were sold was about to send us back to the year 1900 and destroy us.

It’s easy to feel cheated out of the promise of a future that never came. We don’t have flying cars or jetpacks. In that sense, the year 2000 looked a lot like 1900. Yet the world changed so dramatically in so many more important ways. In the same lifetime as someone who knew computers to be enormous structures spanning multiple rooms to perform simple calculations, I’m now writing this on a thin, glowing steel slab of pure magic.  20

Sean Patrick McCarron

It’s easy to feel cheated out of the promise of a future that never came.

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

M

y new comic book project VAUDEVILLAINS is drawn by hand with brush and ink, heavily influenced by traditional animation as well as comics like BONE and Calvin & Hobbes. It takes place in 1999 and, as many may have predicted, it looks at the turn of the previous century. The story follows two circus runaways: a naive but well-intentioned boy named Iver, born bat-eared and bald, and Harvey, a ginger-haired guttersnipe whose arrogance belies deep sensitivity and insecurity.

Together, these two anti-heroes, dedicated to a life of delinquency despite a complete lack of criminal acumen, will try to make their fortune off of a Y2K scam.

The first issue has just been released, with many more on the way. It’s going to be a huge adventure, and I hope you’ll take the time to check it out at www.inkpadpress.ca. 

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

21

ARTWORK BY ANGELA MA

the problem is THE

OTHER HALF Dalya Cohen

I

am left-handed. I am creative. I am that artistic, free spirited, go-where-the-windtakes-me type. I love sitting in my sunroom on a lazy Sunday afternoon and painting. I thrive on creation; I love to create. I love life, and I love not knowing where it will take me.

I find technology cumbersome, and I don’t think that we should be burdened by the obsessive need to advertise our lives.

I prefer to explore the world the way it is – tangible, malleable.

22

I

am right-handed. I am logical. I am scheduled, precise and mathematical. I don’t like to waste time or energy. I don’t do anything just for the fun of it. I like things to be clear and concise – no bullshit. I don’t have room in my life for that frou-frou, waking up at noon, lying in bed all day crap.

When I ask you a question, I want an answer. I will not send six e-mails, I will send one. I wake up at 5:30 every morning and am at the gym by 6:00. I am at work by 8:30, and starting on my to-do list by 8:45. Success is my aspiration. I don’t play games, but I do play chess. Chess is logical, representing the lens through which I view life.

Plan ahead, evaluate risk, strategize, make a move, and prepare for the consequences.

Some say that a picture is worth a thousand words. I say it’s worth more. Everything I create is an expression of myself.

My daydreams and the things that I imagine are brought to life through beautiful, inexplicable, indescribable artistic expression.

All mediums are there to be explored – they are springboards for human communication, just waiting for someone to manipulate them into being. There is no need for linearity or sequence.

When I create, I close my eyes and let my mind speak for itself.

I crave adventure. I want to imbibe every moment of life. But there are moments, flashes of life I can’t exactly remember. I will find myself in an unknown place, unsure of how I got there. I would love to know what it is about these places that I am so completely and inexplicably drawn to.

Sometimes I crave structure. Especially when I find myself in one of those bizarre reveries just as I wake up, as if I have no self-awareness, but I know that something is off. There is time that is unaccounted for, but it’s not completely gone. It’s as if I became someone else, and can’t remember the details of this other half.

I am not crazy; I am meticulous.

When I see a problem, I fix it. I begin by outlining the problem, then establishing a strategy to accomplish what needs to get done. I hate backtracking, but sometimes it is necessary to achieve the end goal.

When I see someone wearing wornout denim and a loose fitting shirt, holes in both and paint splattered all over, I am forced to question their purpose. What kind of productivity can come from this brand of ‘ambition’, or lack thereof? I’ll tell you – none.

It is so demoralizing when I have to explain where I have been. Why I have not answered any calls, nor responded to e-mails. Sometimes it is only a few days, sometimes an entire month. But the bigger problem is that I don’t know where I have been.

It is not the kind of memory loss that comes with overindulgence, when you wake up groggy with half formed memories from a night of debauchery. No, this is different. It feels more like an out-of-body experience, or an out-of-mind experience.

Like I woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and I just became someone else.

I should know better than to be surprised. No matter how strongly I believe in my identity, there is always the potential that today will bring the blackness, darkness, and unconsciousness that I will never be able to shake.

When I wake up, I revel in the moment that the sun touches my face. It is the moment before I know which half I am today. There is this brief moment of lucidity before my body determines if it will represent my left or my right, my rigidity or my creativity. I am both, one in the same, but I am also neither. I am neither because I can never fully be one or the other. It is impossible to live a complete life when you are multiple people sharing the same body. And so I live the half-lived life of each person that I am. I would be happy being either half, happy as the free spirit or as the structured. But the problem – my problem – is that there are two halves. I will never fully be one while there is always another. The problem is the other half.  VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

23

ARTWORK BY JONSSON LIU

LAST FRIDAY NIGHT Devra Charney & Kaila Radan

H

ello, and welcome to Club With Generic Name And Bad Music. I am Reasonable Bouncer who will let you in because luckily for you, it’s still before 10:00 PM. Yes, you’ll be the only people in the club for a while but hey, here’s a voucher for $1 off Fancy Drink You Can’t Afford Anyway. Cover is $10. I’m just going to ask you for your IDs and—this is an Optimum card.

Heyy, I’m your Drunk Friend who made you come here in the first place and now conveniently forgot my ID at home. Hahaha let’s take this cab and we’ll be back in no time! Also, I think you have to pay because my ID is conveniently in my wallet, but you’re cool with that, right?

Thanks so much! I’m now going to compliment you profusely while promising to pay you back even though I have no intention of doing so and will probably forget all about this by tomorrow morning. (an hour and a half later) Hello, welcome back to Club With Generic Name And Bad Music. Reasonable Bouncer is inside breaking up a fight, so now you will be graced with my presence for the rest of the evening.

During the day I work at Home Depot, but in the evenings I run this joint for slightly more than minimum wage. I also train as a body builder and will use my muscles to intimidate you. My name is Condescending Bouncer, and I will do everything I can to make sure you don’t get into this club. You were here earlier? Reasonable Bouncer said he’d let you cut the line? No can do. I’m sending you to the back of the line. I will however proceed to let in this group of giggling girls who say their friends are already inside.

Wait time is approximately 40 minutes for anybody wearing jeans. (an hour later) I hope you enjoyed your wait in the freezing cold.

I am going to act like I don’t recognize either one of you and take over a year scanning every detail on your ID. Brown hair? Check. Blue eyes?

Check. Height 5'6"? Check. I will now ask you for a second piece of ID because it’s been a long wait, and I want to make it longer. Please continue to look into the distance in order to avoid making eye contact as I scrutinize this photo and your face repeatedly.

24

(10 minutes later) It’s me again, Your Drunk Friend. I’m sooo glad you came out tonight, girls’ night only! OMG is that Hot Guy Who Lifeguards? I will now disappear into a crowd of gyrating people without caring that you will spend the next 20 minutes trying to find me. You won’t see me again until the end of the night.

(30 minutes later) Hello, I am Snooty Bartender who refuses to acknowledge you.

I am going to pretend you are invisible while taking the order of the guy standing directly behind you.

Hey there. I am Unattractive Douchebag who will awkwardly hit on you despite your obvious lack of interest. Can I get your number?

Don’t worry gorgeous, I’m here to save the day. I am God’s Gift To Women and will sweep you off your feet and onto the dance floor whether you like it or not. I am not afraid to use force. Now I will try to impress you with my lame dance moves that consist of grinding my sweaty body all over your new outfit. Wanna go home with me? The other ten girls I asked said no, but that in no way discourages me from trying to get with every female in this club.

(30 minutes later) OMG where have you been!? It’s me, Your Drunk Friend, and I’ve allegedly spent the past hour looking all over for you. We both know it isn’t true, but I’m still going to insist that you’re the one who left me. I’m also going to ask if you’re okay to make it home alone because I’ll be spending the night with Random Boy Whose Arm Is Draped Around My Neck. When I call you in the morning, remember that this is your fault. You owe my boyfriend an explanation.

(20 minutes later) Hello, it’s Employee From The Only Pizza Place Still Open At This Time. I am going to politely ask your order even though I already have your gluten free no cheese pizza waiting. Here it is, lukewarm as usual. See you next Friday night.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

ARTWORK BY TYLER HAYWARD

i didn’t do anything S U B S TA N T I A L this morning Rachelle Zalter

I

t’s like this. Today, my alarm clock woke me up. The ringing sound called for action and two options came to mind: press snooze or get my ass out of bed. I pressed snooze. Four minutes later, I sat up with enough momentum to stir me. I threw off my covers and headed for the bathroom. I brushed my teeth, washed my face, went downstairs, and was faced with another option: scrambled eggs or oatmeal. I microwaved some steel oats and turned the kettle on for coffee. Coffee wasn’t just an option – it was a requirement. I ate my breakfast in silence and thought about what music I could play. I had a staring contest with my dog. I had a staring contest with my phone. Both times I lost. I didn’t do anything substantial this morning, but here’s the thing: I could have stayed in bed or I could have gone for a jog. I could have pressed snooze four more times or I could have set my alarm one hour later. I could have made my bed or I could have taken my duvet downstairs. I could have taken my duvet outside and tossed it over my shoulders while I went for a jog.

That would have been difficult though, so I could have walked instead.

I could have bumped into a friend while I was walking around with my duvet over my shoulders, and my friend could have laughed.

It would be a weird situation.

I probably would have laughed.

I could have bumped into a stranger and they could have found my cape-like duvet endearing… or alarming.

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

I could have made a friend who remained a friend. I could have made a friend who turned into an enemy or the love of my life.

This morning wasn’t significant, but it could have been. We make many decisions in life, often without realizing it. A lot of the time we limit our options.

It’s either sleep or wake up. It’s scrambled eggs or oatmeal.

It’s finish reading this or insult me by stopping. But I’m starting to think that if we spent less time following routine and more time considering alternatives, we might find ourselves in a very different place. I can’t accept that the reason we are who we are is only because of these big, important events that mostly occurred in our childhood. I think we make tiny decisions every day that have huge effects. I think that tiny decisions can turn into big decisions.

I think that tiny decisions in the lives of the people around us influence our lives too.

It’s impossible to keep track of it all. I can’t physically know if the breakfast I had or the walk I didn’t go on today will impact my future. I have no perception of how many times I could have met someone or could have become a part of something but instead decided to put my

headphones in or text a friend. Here’s what I do know though. Life is a stream of consciousness. And I don’t mean that all of life is

typed out like a Sylvia Plath novel and that every word reflects the thoughts inside a busy mind. I don’t mean that, but I mean it in the literal sense. Life (with the exception of sleep) is being awake and aware from each moment to the next.

It’s a stream of consciousness, yet how we choose to be awake, and how aware we choose to be is up to us. I’m just thinking that we get a lot of choices and we leave a lot of it to chance. I don’t know how aware I can possibly be of all the opportunities a single instance provides, but I’d like to be more aware. I’d like to amplify consciousness for an instant. I want it to be distinguishable. I want to be able to say that was when everything changed.  25

HAPPY 22ND BIRTHDAY! Marlene Malik

Dearest Georgia, I am writing to wish you a belated and spectacular 22nd birthday. I hope you didn’t think I’d forgotten about my spunky younger self! I know it’s weird getting letters from your alternate-dimension self but I think it’s also rather comforting and kind of neat.

Your perspective on this supernatural ordeal will change by 28 (when I’ll be 38, good heavens), you’ll see.

Georgia, you’re going to have to bear with me as I attempt to share with you some slivers of wisdom that I have collected over the past 32 years (in place of a tangible birthday gift, which I find somewhat overrated and difficult to send through the multiple dimensions of the Universe).

I will begin with telling you about Mymble, my best friend in high school. Mymble dyed her hair plum and played the trumpet in the school marching band. She wore witty shirts and glided around our high school track while singing Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers medleys. This girl was the bee’s knees. It took two years, but eventually, all our peers came to adore her. Not that it mattered; Mymble loved Mymble and everyone else she ever met, even the ass-hats (and there was a plethora of those). She and life had a good thing going. Whenever

Motion isn’t the same as progress, so it’s okay to be still when everyone else seems to be moving fast.

I’m forgetting to be me or getting caught up in other peoples’ perceptions – all that toxic jazz – I think of Mymble. So Georgia, whenever you feel like you’re not enough, that you’d rather be someone else, or you stop listening to your soul’s groovy tune, think of Mymble and get your Georgia on, like only Miss Georgia can.

Then there was Antoine, the French prince that got away. Alas, he was not actually royalty but he and I shared this otherworldly connection, and in this other world, he was a prince to me. His sense of humour was impeccable; we spent 85% of our time together barely being able to breathe from all the laughter. I recommend finding someone who is a complete person, with or without you, and who only complements how awesome you already are. He’ll put everything into perspective and teach you about how vital it is to enjoy the beautiful, bad, whimsical, and mundane bits of life.

On that note, your prince may get his dream job when you get yours on the other side of the planet. You’ll learn how to be alone, how to rock sweet solitude and how to be the best, most badass 26

ARTWORK BY ANGELA BUSSE-GIBSON

version of yourself. Since only you are around for the whole duration of your life, you better nurture the heck out of your relationship with yourself. It’ll be the most loving, abundant, magical and meaningful relationship you ever have. I now grant you permission to send me the sassiest reply you can muster about how lame I am, preaching self-love. Then you can send me one about how wise I am in ten years. I’ll wait.

Some general tips Mom gave us that are beyond valid (please don’t show this to her, imagine the ego boost that would ensue): Reading will change your life, so log off whatever instant book or face gram you’re always on and read something good. Motion isn’t the same as progress, so it’s okay to be still when everyone else seems to be moving fast. No one has to approve of the career you pursue apart from yourself. Money and meaning emerge naturally and, if you keep at it, you can have a job where you’re making the world a better place while being able to buy yourself those boxes of organic dark chocolate you love (which is so gross, how the heck do you eat that stuff?). And most importantly, happiness is the only thing everyone is really after. Sometimes happiness is a night walk, catching the right train, a cup of tea, a day at the bookstore, dancing in your living room or spending the day with someone who appreciates good tunes and three-course meals. Happiness isn’t some conquest, it’s a colourful and dynamic choice.

I wish I could meet you, young Georgia. I know you’re doing me proud and growing and loving and being a beacon of light over there on planet Earth. Take whatever advice sounded good to you and go ahead – make lots of mistakes! It turns out no one’s keeping track of them anyways.

With love,

Your badass other-worldly self who resides somewhere in this big ol’ Universe.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

DOUBLE LIFE Valerie Cui

I

woke up feeling a little groggy and disoriented. There was a pounding in my head that meant my Monday morning was already off to a great start. Looping the ends of my tie together while buttering my bagel, I was out the door in less than ten minutes.

It was on the subway when I realized he was right in front of me.

I had hoped that I wouldn’t see him until later in the day, but he had a way of making sure I couldn’t ignore him. We locked eyes and stared until I asked a question I didn’t really want to hear an answer to.

“So, how was your weekend?”

I cringed as he told me about all the clubs he went to, the explicit details of encounters with women, a trip to the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and his poker strategy, which sounded like it was digging a hole of debt for him. I don’t understand how people can live like that. I hoped that my expression didn’t look as tortured as I felt. When he finally finished glorifying his outings, he tossed the question back to me.

“I finished a novel, caught up with some friends from school. I don’t do much on weekend evenings,” I replied. I mulled over the idea of telling him I thought sleeping around was disgusting – degrading to himself and those he did it with. I thought about just how different our futures would be, about the caring wife and kids I’d have. But I stayed quiet, wanting this conversation to be over. And

ARTWORK BY KANDICE BURYTA

thankfully it was. I was eager to bury myself in paperwork so I could forget about him.

I ran into him in the washroom at lunch. I made a mental note to take fewer breaks at places where I might see him.

“Don’t you love this job? We barely need to think about the work we do. It’s the easiest money we’ll ever make!”

He was the type of guy parents tell their kids to stay away from.

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

I cringed as he told me about all the clubs he went to, the explicit details of encounters with women, a trip to the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and his poker strategy.

The one that your overachieving friends warned would make you lose focus and drag you down. I wasn’t going to go down that path.

“I don’t understand how you can be so complacent. I need to get a better job where I don’t have to cater to someone else’s every whim, where I won’t be treated like a monkey with a peanut brain. I can’t imagine how much respect I’d lose if I stayed here for the rest of my life.”

“Whatever, don’t be so uptight! Life’s too short and it’s about having fun. Listen, we’ve got good-paying jobs, who cares if they’re boring? It’s enough that I can have as much fun as I want on the weekend. I won’t add any stress by vying for that promotion, when there’s no guarantee of even getting it. Don’t get tied down to anything or anyone. Minimize your responsibilities, because there’s so much of the world left to see and enjoy. Why don’t you forget about work and family, and have fun with me?”

I gave up trying to convince him of anything. This thorn in my side would always see things differently and pursue a lifestyle incompatible with my dreams. It was far too difficult to reconcile our views, and his incessant party lifestyle frustrated me. I made one last attempt to talk to him.

“I can’t let myself do that. Listen, I know we’re very different, so I’ll tell you what: why don’t we both keep to ourselves and live the way we each think is best? I have a reputation to uphold, responsibilities to fulfill and a future to plan for. Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 is where I thrive.”

“And I’ll keep enjoying my life the way it is. Weekends are when I come alive.”

The door opened and our heads swiveled in unison. I took another look at him. I recognized a face of indecision reflected in my expression, and our mutual irritation for one another. And I decided that I had had enough of myself for one day.  27

MYSTERIOUS LUMPS Olivia Fasullo

T

he doctor looks at me and my mother sitting side by side in her examination room. My mother is holding a McDonald’s coffee and muffin. I don’t know what I would have preferred, my sixty-yearold family doctor, who has known me since birth, or a younger doctor from the Wal-Mart walk-in clinic. We chose Wal-Mart.

“So, what seems to be the problem?”

The doctor asks, looking between the two of us.

There’s a pause.

Then I go for it, “I want a breast exam.”

The doctor gives me a look.

“Not to be forward but I want a breast exam.” I manage to give a chuckle through the ridiculousness of the situation. It took thirty seconds to get to second base.

It’s the end of the day, and I’m standing in front of my full length mirror in my underwear.

Oh God. My bra has been rubbing me wrong

You know, some women just have lumpy boobs? Like maybe she has a case of the lumpy boob? since 9 this morning and all I have wanted to do all day is take this death trap off.

Lace and ribbon may give an impression of delicacy but that does not stop a bra from cutting into skin.

Free of my bra, I take a moment in the full mirror once more.

Are boobs supposed to look like that?

Why are they so floppy?

Do I have weird nipples?

What if I’ve been living my life in ignorance of my odd boobs?

I try pushing them up in my hands, then let them flop. Was that the right amount of flop, or are my boobs already sagging? Are they even centred?

I squish them and suddenly I’m a ARTWORK BY MARIELLE GORDON

Vogue model. Squish, squish, squish.

Wait a second… There’s something hard.

First boob: soft. Second boob: soft… and then hard.

That’s not right.

She apologizes for how cold her hands are.

I messed up putting on the gown. So now I’m lying on the examination table with the gown pushed completely down.

Her gaze is professional, staring as far away from mine as possible. There’s a horrible moment where she’s feeling around and can’t find anything. This woman is going to think I’m some kind of breast exam pervert.

Then she says, “Oh, now I feel it.”

That’s a much worst moment.

“Now turn your head to the left and put your right arm above your head,” says the radiologist.

I’m staring at the wall in a Rose-from-Titanic pose, as she takes snapshots of my boob.

Ultrasound me like one of your French girls.

As the doctor starts leaving the room, my mother questions her, “Don’t some women just have lumpy boobs?”

The doctor gives her a confused look.

“You know, some women just have lumpy boobs? Like maybe she has a case of the lumpy boob?” She looks at the doctor as if this were medical terminology.

The doctor gives a look to me to see if I understand what my mother is saying.

Instead, I laugh away the moment when I realize neither of us know anything about our own bodies. 

28

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

TWINNING THE THE VOTE VOTE TWINNING Shruti Ramesh Ramesh Shruti Using ‘twin studies’ to examine genetics connections to voting behaviour

C

oming off the heels of the MSU Presidential Election and awaiting the impending federal election, politics and voting may be on your mind (but maybe not – none of my housemates knew that). A topic that tends to come up when discussing elections is voting behaviour – why do people vote the way they do? What factors are at play in determining someone’s political stance? Understanding voting behavior can help explain how and why decisions are made by the electorate (in the case of the aforementioned elections, this means you!)

For a long time, the dominant paradigm was that people’s political attitudes have been almost exclusively shaped by environmental factors. The idea of people being born with political predispositions may strike many as implausible. Recently, however, there has been significant academic debate about the potential role of genetics in shaping political attitudes. If their role were definitively proven, genetic factors would have to be considered in all political scientists’ models of the voting process. The possibility for a genetic role in voting behaviours has largely been investigated through twin studies.

 What Are Twin Studies?

Although there has been a recent shift towards molecular genetic techniques, researchers have used twins to assess the degree of genetic influence on more complex behaviours. Due to zygosity, which refers to whether twins are formed from two separate eggs or a single egg, twins can have different degrees of genetic similarity. Monozygotic twins (MZ) share 100% of their genes, meaning that most differences in traits, such

as height or intelligence quotient, are largely due to experiences or environmental factors.

Fraternal, or dizygotic, twins (DZ) share 50% of their genes, which is the same percentage shared by non-twin full siblings.  Experimental Design Twin studies compare similarities by manipulating the environment of MZ and DZ twins. If MZ twins who are raised in separate and differing environments still share a trait that DZ twins do not, this implies that genetics play an important role in developing that trait. Of course, this is determined by comparing the results of numerous studies with different manipulations. We will consider one particular study done on the genetic transmission of political orientations.  Alford, Funk, and Hibbing In this study, three political scientists combined relevant findings in behavioural genetics with their own analysis of data on a large sample of twins. Contrary to the assumptions embedded in political science research, they hypothesized that political attitudes have genetic and environmental causes.

This study considers current conceptions of how attitudes are formed before moving onto a discussion of modern behavioural genetics: what is the process by which a genetic allele could shape attitudes or dispositions? The example provided is an allele mutation resulting in lower production of the neurotransmitter serotonin. People possessing a certain allele mutation produced ~80% less serotonin and were more likely to suffer from unipolar depression.

It was acknowledged by the researchers that the case is rarely this simple and that a more likely explanation would be gene-environment interactions. For example, consider a mutation on a specific chromosome 17 gene (5-TT). This gene has a long and short allele, and twin studies were used to determine the relative effect of having either the short or long allele. It was found that individuals with the short 5-TT allele in higher-stress environments were more likely to display behaviours associated with depression compared to those in lower-stress environments, or even to those with the long form who suffered through a higher-stress environment. A similar approach was undertaken regarding several genetic and environmental influences on political attitudes.

The results of these studies indicate that genetics play an important role in shaping political attitudes and ideologies in terms of whether one tends towards more conservative stances or votes for the incumbent, or person currently in office. The role of genetics in terms of selecting formal party identifications is still unclear. Also uncertain are what an established connection between genetics and voting will mean for predicting voting populations. It is important to note that these conclusions are not uncontested and have elicited critical debate amongst geneticists, psychologists, and political scientists alike.

More than anything, this calls for further investigation into the role of genetics in political science. Until that occurs, the next time you catch yourself in a heated political debate with someone holding opposing views, you can step back and consider – maybe it’s in their genes! 

ARTWORK BY TASFIA ASHAN

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

29

tied in dreams don’t have to be realistic

grenoble in moonlight landing among the stars

Mujda Hakime

30

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

YIN & YANG Michele Zaman

I

n the beginning, all we knew was the way the stars danced. The way they followed the others’ lead, the way they twirled and whirled at one another’s mercy was perhaps the most exquisite sight of all.

Occasionally when the stars are close enough, they embrace.

Fascinated by the very essence of their consort’s being they drew closer and closer until they kissed ever so gently. This is when vivacity ruled over them. Love consumed the stars in such a way it seemed as though they were going to burst from euphoria.

Occasionally when the stars are close enough, they collide. Tantalized by the very essence of their foe’s being they drew closer and closer until their individual lights violently clashed. This is when dread ruled over them. They became hungry, slowly devouring the other. The stars were so filled with hate that they burst with rage.

At first, there was shade; her name was Yin. She was alone and anchored to the earth. Wherever Yin walked, misery followed.

Sometimes she dreamed of seeing a white flower but every time she got close, it shriveled up and shattered into a million pieces. She wandered high and low, desperate to fill the holes inside of her. She did not know what she was searching for; perhaps she was searching for a flower that would live long enough to speak to her. She felt as if her soul was tied up in knots, with every movement squeezing

different parts of her soul and making her want to scream and cry.

Yin felt helpless, so all she ever did was wander high and low.

Then came the sun; his name was Yang. Even though happiness followed him everywhere he went, Yang felt a crippling emptiness inside. Sometimes he dreamed of a black flower, but every time he got close to his flower it would burst into a thousand flames. He wandered low and high, desperately trying to ease his pain. He did not know what he was searching for; perhaps a flower that would live long enough for him to touch. Yang felt hopeless, so all he ever did was wander low and high.

As Yin was walking, she had her head up trying to see if she could catch a glimpse of the stars, while Yang was standing still, holding his head down trying to avoid all the stars. Yin was so lost in her own thoughts that she crashed into Yang. Yin looked up at and felt light for the first time, as if someone was untying all those knots in her soul. She wanted to cry, but this time from joy. Yang looked down at Yin and felt darkness for the first time. It eased his soul in ways he could not imagine. He found what he had been looking for: her embrace. They became inseparable, almost like two halves of the same whole. They danced, they talked and they promised that they would follow the other’s lead for the rest of eternity. 

The way they twirled and whirled at one another’s mercy was perhaps the most exquisite sight of all.

ARTWORK BY HAMAEEL KHAN

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

31

DELOS AND THE DOUBLED CUBE Jesse Bettencourt

W

ar brought the army of Sparta to the gates of Athens, though no Spartan soldier would enter to conquer the cursed city. Athens was crippled, fire and smoke along the skyline, with only a third of its citizens remaining. The rest burned atop massive funeral pyres; a devastating plague, worse than any known to antiquity, had entered through the ports of Athens and consumed the city. The Spartans withdrew, abandoning certain victory rather than risk contact with the affliction.

Inside the city walls, there was turmoil. A group of consultants returned from Delphi with word from the Oracle: Athens had incurred the wrath of Apollo, and only a tribute to the god would alleviate this pestilence. However, the Oracle’s instructions were cryptic, so the consultants went to Plato to decipher her message.

As they approached Plato’s academy, engraved above the threshold of the entrance they read: Let no one ignorant of Geometry enter here.

The Oracle had told the Athenians of a temple on the island of Delos, the birthplace of Apollo. At the centre of the temple was an altar holding a perfect golden cube. To appease Apollo and end the plague, the Athenians were to replace this cube with another exactly double its volume.

Plato explained this task to the consultants, and they embarked for Delos. Arriving at the temple, the consultants carefully measured the cube, weighed the gold, and determined its volume. Then, to double the cube’s volume, the consultants simply measured out exactly twice that weight of gold and smithed this amount into a perfect cube. The duplicated cube, having twice as

much gold, must have twice the volume.

They placed the new cube on the altar and returned to Athens. Upon their arrival, they found that the plague had lifted, as if Apollo had been appeased.

However, exactly one year later, the

and his students would later be synthesized by Euclid, the father of geometry. Euclid listed five statements, called axioms, from which all geometric, and therefore divine truths must be derived.

These axioms allow for the existence of infinite straight lines, circles, and the equivalency of all right angles.

From these five axioms, all pure geometric objects must be constructed. There are only two tools available to facilitate these constructions: a straightedge and a compass. We must construct everything else in geometry from only lines and circles.

As a geometric problem,

Athens was crippled, fire and smoke along the skyline, with only a third of its citizens remaining.

32

plague returned. Devastated, the consultants returned to Plato, demanding an explanation for his deception. Had they not fulfilled the Oracle’s instructions exactly as he had described?

Plato, having learned of the mechanical, imprecise methods by which the consultants duplicated the cube, expelled them from his academy. The consultants had made no attempt to derive the measurements for the doubled cube from universal truths of Geometry.

How could they have doubled the cube with certainty, and appeased Apollo, unless the method was proven rigorously through pure geometric principles?

These geometric principles outlined by Plato

To appease Apollo and end the plague, the Athenians were to replace this cube with another exactly double its volume.

ARTWORK BY JULIE GUEVARA

doubling the golden cube on the island of Delos is a matter of determining the ratio between the edges of two cubes. Of course, we know through algebra that side lengths of a cube are given by the cube-root of the volume. If we say that the original golden cube has a volume of one, then the edges must each be length one. The doubled cube, having a volume of two, must have edges of length ³√2.

In accordance with the Oracle’s instructions, Plato restated that to lift the plague in

norance of geometry. Regardless, we now know the futility of her instruction. Even if the plague in Athens was due to the wrath of Apollo, and even if his wrath could have been satiated by the doubling of the golden cube, no rigorous geometric solution was to be found by the Greeks, though not for a lack of trying. This geometric problem remained open and investigated for over two millennia.

The night before his death, in May of 1832, Evariste Galois, a French mathematician, frantically collected his unpublished manuscripts and composed a letter to his close friend synthesizing his mathematical ideas. In this letter, Galois laid the foundation for fundamental areas in abstract algebra, namely Group Theory. The following morning, Galois was shot in the abdomen during a duel, allegedly over an ongoing affair with a married woman. Galois was 20 years old and died unrecognized for his mathematical achievements.

Five years later Pierre Wantzel used the results from Galois’ letter to prove the ultimate futility of the Oracle’s instruction: there is no possible construction using a straightedge and a compass that will generate a cube with edges of the length ³√2.

The problem of constructing a duplicate cube with twice the volume of another by using Euclidean geometryis, is in fact impossible. Ignorant of geometry or not, the Athenians would never have appeased Apollo.

Either by the laws of epidemiology or Euclidean geometry, the Athenians were powerless against their plague. 

This geometric problem remained open and investigated for over two millennia.

Athens, they must prove that the cube with doubled volume had edges with the length of the ³√2, using only a straightedge and a compass.

It’s impossible to know the Oracle’s intention in setting the Athenians to this task.

Perhaps it was to shame them for their neglect of mathematics and their ig-

33

ARTWORK BY MALEEHA A. QAZI

FEAR IN THE CITY OF LOVE Harry Krahn

A

s the memory of 2014 fades, 2015 has started on what seems to be increasingly unstable footing. Recent events, chief among them the attack on Charlie Hebdo, have cast the defining motif of this uncertainty as a struggle between Islam and the West and provoked a wide array of responses. Many Islamophobic individuals have had their prejudices encouraged. Other people have been incorrectly labelled as Islamophobic for attempting to criticize anything Islamic. In fact, some have even been called Islamophobia-phobic simply for not being scared enough. Charlie Hebdo was unique in that it managed to mostly polarize these opinions.

One side states in blunt conviction that the newspaper should have avoided publishing offensive material in the first place, while the other hyperbolizes the loss of free speech.

However, the common ground between these two camps seems to be that both are driven by an underlying fear of Islam.

In catastrophes like this it is clear that our attitudes are shaped by how the news is presented. For example, diseases and natural disasters make for perfect news because they are non-human, often poorly understood, and antagonistic in nature.

The mix of intimidation and mystery helps 34

keep us on edge. The Ebola virus outbreak of 2014 is an excellent example of just this.

Instead of explaining how the virus is prevented or transmitted, media outlets chose to report almost exclusively on the disease’s spread and death toll. The rumours we have heard range from believable, as in the case of infected Liberian tourists, to ridiculous, such as the epidemic necessitating nuclear warfare. In essence, we were immediately told what was happening, but kept in the dark about why or how it was happening.

Islam’s portrayal in the media is eerily reminiscent of this technique. The discourse on Islam is rife with the same vague terminology of the ‘spread’ or ‘survivors’ of institutions like ISIS. Buzzwords such as ‘Islamic extremists’ are used both to homogenize Islamic culture and link it to violence. This technique is used to artificially shoehorn many complex global issues into the mould of an Us vs. Islam conflict. ‘Islamic extremists’ are painted as heartless killers, dehumanized and irrational. Despite the heterogeneity and size of the religion, Western media sources commonly present information that supports only a one-dimensional view of Islam in order to support this illusion.

All that is needed is simplistic thought to allow for the conflation of Islam and violence

and to incite fear, hatred and racism.

We should never allow fear alone to determine our response to violence. The attack on Charlie Hebdo shows us exactly why: critics tend to run afoul of free speech, while sympathizers often incorrectly place the blame on Islam itself. Fear allows people like Anjem Choudary to worsen the problem, claiming that “Muslims do not believe in the concept of freedom of expression” for the purpose of legitimizing and encouraging conflict. In the words of Frank Herbert, “Fear is the mind killer,” the thing that prevents us from thinking straight. So how do we go about understanding the world if the media is so unreliable?

The antidote to fear is critical thought.

We need to ask why or how something is happening, look for reputable sources, and deconstruct flimsy arguments. If an article posted on The Daily Mail or The Huffington Post links back to a blog, ignore it. If it starts with “You won’t believe,” ignore it. There are sources to trust, like CBC, Reuters, or AP. Doubt descriptive articles; look for facts and numbers. Think about why something was written, and for whom. We live in a world designed to pull us in a hundred new directions every day, and if we let ourselves be pulled, we only have ourselves to blame.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

ARTWORK BY LAUREN GORFINKEL

NET NEUTRALITY Imran Dhalla

S

ince its inception, the Internet has created a fairly level playing field for users, empowering individuals to share their views with the world, exchange data, and enhance communication media over the years. It has also paved the way for small startup companies to conduct transactions over the cloud and to streamline the service industry to a whole new level. It is the Internet that has been responsible for massive startups like Facebook supplanting Myspace, Netflix supplanting a painfully declining Blockbuster, the birth of exciting new innovations such as Uber and Snapchat, and the rise of new competitors in the e-commerce industry like Alibaba.

The concept of the ‘free Internet’ is referred to as net neutrality, a term coined by Tim Wu, Columbia University law professor.

Net neutrality, a principle that suggests that all traffic on the Internet should be treated equally, may seem logical to the average person. However, this principle has recently sparked numerous debates since the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) decision in the United States. Novel regulations have been proposed that, if implemented, would eliminate net neutrality. These new regulations would allow Internet service providers to administer a ‘fast lane’ for corporations that can afford to pay more, as well as charge for services differently depending on usage.

This issue affects Canadians because, even though the FCC is technically based in the United States, the majority of day-to-day web traffic in Canada passes through American servers; therefore,

Canadian use is almost inherently subject to American regulations. Also, should this two-tiered system be implemented, it is a sure bet that monopolistic Canadian telecom giants like Rogers and Bell will push for some innocuous-sounding ‘regulatory adjustment’ in order to advocate similar policies up north. This could lead to Internet service providers (ISPs) like Bell discriminating against consumers by charging excessive amounts for access to non-Bell content through their service.

downloading. All data goes through a single connection and consumers are charged a monthly fee.

Abolishing net neutrality would enable ISPs to manage consumers’ Internet access and charge them based on usage. As a hypothetical example, Bell could block services like Google Maps in favour of their Bell-branded version of the application. Imagine trading a Netflix account for an inferior television streaming service that doesn't even have the shows you want to binge watch on a Saturday night.

Abolishing net neutrality would allow corporations to pay for priority Internet traffic space, leaving small startup businesses lagging behind their competitors because they simply cannot afford to beat corporate giants that have millions of dollars in reserves. Bar the limitations in the entrepreneurial ambitions of the Canadian public, discrimination and blacking out websites that the ISPs disagree with would be common practice.

For example, when its workers were striking in 2005, Telus censored all access to a website run by the Telecommunications Workers Union (TWU) on the grounds that their views posed a threat to Telus’s business endeavours.

2015 promises to bring more into this debate, and it is important to remember that the status quo is not of a neutral net, but one dominated by gigantic tech supremacy and dictatorial ISPs. Furthermore, if we want an Internet that exceeds our expectations and truly be the pinnacle of our unbiased visions, we the users will have to come up with a lot more than just a few angry letters, tweets, and online petitions. 

Bell could block services like Google Maps in favour of their Bell-branded version of the application.

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

 Current Practices vs. Proposed Changes At the moment, ISPs provide consumers with unlimited access to the Internet.

While they can limit your speeds, ISPs’ main motive for this is to slow down illegal

35

…IS BETTER THAN ONE Patrick de New

T

hroughout the writings of many film and art critics, you’ll hear one phrase uttered from the most renowned of connoisseurs to your disgruntled friends: “The first one was better.” Most of the time it’s true; rarely in film or art has the sequel been better than the original.

Movie sequels require a fresh but faithful reinvigoration of the script, plot, and music. The writers must recreate what people loved about the first movie and then expand upon it in the second, walking a fine line between expanding enough and going way into left field where there may as well not have been a sequel at all.

When making a sequel for a video game, of course there are some similarities in wanting to restructure the formula for a different type of story. However, the structure, mechanics, controls, and overall technical aspect of the game are already there, you just need to build on top of what might already be working. Technology and its capabilities are a pinnacle aspect of the progression of games, when looking back at the now archaic 8-bit side scrolling adventures to the graphics, resolution, and sheer magnitude of games like Grand Theft Auto V or Far Cry 4. Even if these games weren’t sequel games like The Last of Us, a visual and technical masterpiece, they are a testament to how much work and artistry goes into the development of games over time on a macro level.

The Elder Scrolls series for instance: when it first started it was a game that could be bought on floppy disks in the early days of 1994. Gameplay, although great for its day, was oftentimes a bit restrictive with a certain bug propensity as well as graphics which some today might liken to newer titles like Minecraft. Now today, with the intricate networks and servers set up for The Elder Scrolls online, graphics are worthy of being postcards to confused grandparents wondering where Tamriel is in their world atlas.

But of course there are always downfalls to this type of potential for sequels. Notably, Final Fantasy, whose games for the past seven years have been regurgitating the same story with the same mechanics and oftentimes not even addressing the problems fans had with the game. Devil May Cry came out on the PlayStation 2 in 2001, and famously the sequel paled gravely in comparison to the first, with a reduced difficulty level, unimpressive gameplay and just frankly a much more coddled and babied version.

You’ll hear one phrase uttered from the most renowned of connoisseurs to your disgruntled friends:

“The first one was better.”

Sequels are always going to be divisive between who liked which Back to the Future most or hated which Transformers the least, but usually you’ll find that there will be more reason to take joy and get excited about sequels in video games than film. Video games are a form of art that not only allows people to enjoy the present but to also get their wallets ready for pre-orders for the future… or at least shout at developers until it comes out, I’m looking at you Valve. Get on Half-Life 3. 

ARTWORK BY HILARY KEE

36

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

READY PLAYER 2 Mackenzie Richardson

M

y greatest regret in life is that I don’t think I’ll ever own a copy of Conker’s Bad Fur Day. That was a game that I remember playing religiously every time I went over to my friend’s house in elementary school.

We would always sneak out of his room late at night and into the den to play just one more match of cavemen versus raptors, or to watch the hilarious Matrix spoof (not that either of us had actually seen The Matrix). This was a game that my friend and I spent hours, days playing. It represents some of the fondest memories I have growing up.

Probably because sports were never really my thing. That’s not to say I didn’t like playing with them, more that the other kids didn’t like me playing them.

I was awkward and chubby; I couldn’t run, jump, catch, throw, shoot, or do anything well. So video games were the one area that I really thought I could have as my own.

I’ll try not to ramble too much, as many of you may not have been as fortunate as I’ve been in your video game backgrounds (although there are many reading this who may have been around since the beginning, and have suffered horribly sore thumbs from an Atari 2600). When I was young, my parents had a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in our house. I remember fondly playing Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt with that incredibly sexy looking light gun (note: it was neither incredible nor sexy). I’m pretty sure I was awful at them, but I had no way of knowing. I didn’t have anyone else to play with. That’s not to say my parents never played with the NES. In fact, they often challenged my grandparents to matches of Dr. Mario on the weekends they came to visit. But I had no one my age who liked video games.

Elementary school was a blessing. I finally found some friends who seemed to share my passion for video games. Sure, they happened to own Nintendo 64s, which I didn’t have, but the principle was the same.

The enjoyment was the same. Every chance I had to sleepover, we’d play GoldenEye, Super Smash Bros., all the classics. Yes, I was at a severe disadvantage because I had never played these before and had no chance to practice, but I loved it. Even when my friends teased me to the point of crying because I was bad, I was beyond happy in-

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

ARTWORK BY RON SCHEFFLER

As video games move ever towards massive multiplayer online games, I hope they never forget their roots. side. Or at least, I think I was.

High school saw a change to that. After years of begging and pleading, I was the happy owner of a PlayStation 3 one jolly Christmas. From then on, my afterschool evenings were filled with swearing at fellow random 15-year-olds across the world.

They too had a lot of pent up stress, rage, and generally pubescent emotions, which somehow were only cooled by shooting virtual characters full of tiny holes.

When I finally came to university, I splurged, and against all better judgment, I got myself a gaming PC. Ever since then, my Steam library has been growing to include an absurd number of titles. Many have sat on their virtual shelves, never downloaded nor installed, but some I have spent hours exploring to their fullest. My girlfriend and I played Portal 2 together, sitting no more than six feet apart one hot and sweaty summer. My room, with its blessed AC unit, was the only habitable retreat from the summer’s scorching sun. She even indulged my ob-

sessive desires and helped me unlock all the achievements.

I have always seen video games as a uniting force. It’s a way for me to hang out with friends I don’t see much of anymore, but also friends I’ve met online, people whom I have never met in real life, who only exist to me as fellow players online. Every once in a while, I convince my house mates to break out some beers and dust off the GameCube for a good old round of Super Smash Bros. Melee, just for old times’ sake.

I even recall one fond evening when a slightly too drunk Sam Godfrey schooled me on the finer points of Mario Tennis.

As video games move ever towards massive multiplayer online games, I hope they never forget their roots. The years of enjoyment I have had with others, staring avidly at an often tiny screen, eyes alight in wonder. Whenever I get bored, I just remember how much fun I had when my friend passed me a controller and told me it was time to play.  37

 Red Gerald Ibe Red The most beautiful colour in the world is red, For this one colour symbolizes both love and danger Or maybe love is just a dangerous thing.

Red, my favorite Taylor Swift album, Stories of love and heartbreak, Like love is a game only the bravest of us may participate in.

Red is warm like the fireplace, As I am chilling with the homies sipping on gin and juice Listening to our favorite records Or red is sizzling, sizzling, sizzling hot, Like the inferno that burns this house down.

And these, These are just random thoughts that occupy my head as I roll around on my bed As I am thinking, We are poets, We are the ones who find meaning in seemingly meaningless things.

We are poets, We are orators, griots, and scribes As we record history, we keep those intricate moments alive.

We deconstruct the complexity of the universe in relation to our soul, And this is what makes us whole This is the red that flows through our veins.

And in this vein, we often do say It is okay, to be okay.

It is okay to say Bad bitch, drop it low, Shake that ass on the floor But also let her know That her sexual energy is the most pure and sincere form of human nature.

For hope and fear are not two sides of the same coin, They are one and the same thing.

Or when she screams in pleasure, or cries out in birthing pain, They are one and the same scream.

If he stands by the glow of the fireplace Or the firefighter fights the flames He sees one and the same thing, Red. The most beautiful colour in the world is red, It is the most honest and the most sincere.

It reminds us that it is okay to love, it is okay to live, and it is okay to hope.

But in this vein Love, life, and hope are all dangerous things. 

Also let her know, That the power that pulses from her person Brings both pain and promise For today it hurts but tomorrow it births But it always bleeds red.

Blood red, Like the bouquet of roses in my lover’s arms.

Blood red, like the colour of silence on a battlefield.

And this is the dichotomy of red, For God creates both volcano and flower One brings forth, while the other devours.

This is the dichotomy of red.

Did the pharaoh not die as the Hebrews fled When God parted the Red Sea? This is the dichotomy of love, For we love to love, yet hate to love See, love is such a dangerous thing.

And this red is the paradox of life For love and hate are not two sides of the same coin, They are one and the same thing.

38

artwork by Ethan Lin & Annie Duan

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

Return Trip

Megan Schlorff

ARTWORK BY ELINA FILICE

R

eturning to a destination is a dream come true for many people. We have the desire to return to a place that resonated with our soul, where we felt things that moved something inside of us.

Going back just makes sense, and it’s often all we can think about.

I felt that way for a long time too. But, as my return trip to Kosovo drew closer and closer, the desire to return began to be replaced by an anxiety about having a new experience. My mind had a clear vision of what my initial trip had entailed, a vision that was so perfect I feared going back and not being able to recreate it.

up right off where we had left it.

We loaded our bags into the same white van that had taken me across the country last year, and it felt like a repeat of the past. Not a monotonous reiteration, but a familiar routine. The ride from the airport revealed more differences. New buildings were being constructed, and our wheels were treading on a recently paved highway.

Many would say that this was necessary progress for this newly declared country whose status has yet to be recognized by other countries. Yet, amidst these differences remained some constants. Green grass stretched across the countryside, littered

Going back just makes sense, and it’s often all we can think about.

So, there I was, somewhere between Zurich and Pristina, Kosovo’s capital, sitting in my airplane seat thinking through memories from the year before and worrying about what lay ahead of me. I worried that the place had changed, and that I had changed, and that we wouldn’t fit together anymore. I looked out the window as the quintessential orange roofs, so characteristic of this Balkan country, came into view. I really was back.

Differences struck me instantly. No longer was there a cold, industrial-looking, single-luggage-carousel airport. In its place was a brand new expanded building complete with escalators, automatic doors, and a café to buy macchiatos.

But when we walked through those doors, the people were there, and they were the same. Sure, they were a year older, a little wiser, maybe slightly more jaded, but they were the same authentic people that I knew from last May. Conversation picked VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

with patches of bright red poppies serving as a reminder of the recent conflicts and tensions that still hover in the air.

The rhythm of the road grounded me until we arrived at the Guest House. Home.

This is the place – the home – we stay in when we are in Kosovo. Professor was there rambling, and Linda, the sweetest housekeeper, was there, ready to give us hugs.

Thus far, my trip had been one constant feeling of déjà vu. Mostly everything was the same as last year. It was comforting, yet I knew that I didn’t want to keep living a replay for the entire month. I was craving new experiences as well.

There is a special place in the centre of the city called Nënë Tereza (Mother Teresa) Square. It’s a bit of a walk from the Guest House, but an enjoyable one with constantly changing scenery – from corner stores, to trees, to busy streets. The route involves walking along uneven streets, past

unrestricted plants and grasses that grow alongside houses and shops. Eventually, you arrive at the “Italian Park” – the name serves as homage to those who created the space. It’s a happening spot with people jogging by, children playing on swings, and your feet trying not to get caught on the cobblestone path. Hidden away to your left when you enter the park is the patio of, go figure, an Italian restaurant. I’m not saying it’s authentic, but I am saying that they make pizza that gets it right in both price and taste. And, like almost all eating establishments in the country, they serve macchiatos. Where can one find the best macchiato – the perfect blend and texture of milk and coffee – in the world? Why, Kosovo of course. Kosovars are proud of their macchiatos, and they enjoy them in an excessive frequency.

It was only appropriate to christen our arrival in the country with a macchiato.

There we sat, outside on the patio with the trees embracing us, gathered together in a circle sipping what would soon become a staple in our diet for the next month. Our guide wanted to know why we decided to come to Kosovo of all places (every Kosovar you meet can hardly fathom why you would choose to visit.) When it was my turn, I said that I wanted to come back and experience more. More – that seemed to capture what I was after. I didn’t want to experience it again, but I wanted to experience it further.

I wanted to dive deeper into concepts, and questions, and stories, and history. Yes, I would visit the same sites and cities, but I wouldn’t view them in the same way, because I was different than the first time, with more space for reflection and inquiry. It was time to reflect deeper the second time around - to ask those questions I let linger, to taste the food I hesitated to try, to absorb beyond my saturation point from last year.  39

Pairs Elina Filice

I

slipped the key into the lock as quietly as I could. I slid into the apartment and saw him sitting at the kitchen table. My efforts for silence had been futile. I flattened my hair and fixed my lipstick with my fingers as he demanded where I’d been, slurring his words. “I didn’t think you’d be up,” I stuttered. Two bare light bulbs that hung from the ceiling were the only source of light in the room, making his bloodshot eyes all the more menacing. “You’ve been drinking,” I said softly. He reared from the table suddenly, sending his chair sliding backwards on its hind legs. Looking at me for the first time since I came in, hot breath filling the room, he fumed that I shouldn’t change the subject. “And what subject would that be?” I shot back. He approached me with two clenched fists. Resorting to my usual escape plan, I muttered, “I’m going to bed,” and tried to slip down the hall. He blocked my way and then grabbed my wrist on my second attempt to escape. “Don’t you dare run away from me right now,” he roared. I screamed, “Don’t touch me—”

I

heard shuffling at the front door; it creaked opened in a vain attempt at subtlety. She paused in the doorway, clearly disappointed that I was still awake. I sat at the table, somehow unable to look at her, when I once thought it was all I ever wanted to do.

“Where’ve you been,” I asked. My trembling voice sounded foreign to me. I swirled my drink, two lonely ice cubes clinked in my cup. She avoided the question and instead commented on my drinking, knowing it would get my blood boiling. I rose from the table and pretended that I wasn’t seeing double. The room spun sideways and my heart pounded so hard I was sure she could hear it. Turning towards her, my chest burned when I noticed her smudged lipstick. I said firmly, “Stop changing the damn subject.” She threw back a reply and attempted, as usual, to run away to the bedroom. I begged her to stay and talk to me, but she screamed, “Don’t touch me—”

ARTWORK BY FRANCO SIMÕES

A small flash of black scurried between them, sending her a foot in the air and him after it, crushing the bug beneath his shoe. They stood, side by side, watching the crumpled cockroach twitch on their apartment floor. What a terrible place to die, they both thought, all alone on the floor of a small apartment, in the middle of the night, the dead of winter. They felt sorry for the small dying creature; they felt sorry for each other, for themselves.

“Three-hundred and twenty,” he said, his eyes still fixed on the cockroach.

“What?” she asked absentmindedly, her eyes, too, unmoving.

“320 million years. That’s how long cockroaches have been around.”

“They’re a lot more resilient than humans. After all of this is gone, after every human endeavor returns to dust, they’ll still be here. Maybe I should clean better,” she pondered.

“It’s not your fault, they enter the cleanest of houses, the best of homes,” he assured her.

“Oh. Pairs,” she sighed.

“What?”

“Just something my mother used to say. Cockroaches always travel in pairs. I’m not gonna be able to sleep tonight if there’s another one in here.”

“So we wait,” he said.

They turned from the dead bug and sat at the table. He poured her a drink from his bottle. She poured him honesty from her heart. They sat there late into the night, waiting on a bug to come out from the shadows. It was there, lurking in the darkness, but with time and patience it would appear, they knew. It was all alone in the world now. It had nowhere to go but towards the light: the two bare bulbs under which they sat. So they waited patiently, though sleep tugged at their eyelids. They waited together, willing the second, lonely cockroach to emerge. They willed it to come out where they could see it, to come out in the open, so they could kill it, soothe themselves, and go to sleep.  40

INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

ARTWORK BY JULIE GUEVARA

ONE

Cathy Huang

Y

ou meet a guy. He’s cute and funny and charming. He makes you happier than you’ve been in a long time, maybe happier than you’ve ever been. You get along so well and you have so much to talk about.

But then the talking turns into fighting and the fights start happening more and more often.

He tells you he loves you and he cares about you, he does, really he does.

He doesn’t sit there playing video games while you cry in a crumpled heap on the kitchen floor. When you get him tickets to meet his favourite artist for your anniversary, his gift isn’t to break up with you.

He doesn’t end things over and over only to change his mind a week later. He doesn’t promise to see you, only to bail on you every time. He doesn’t keep changing his mind about how he feels about you.

He doesn’t text you every few weeks saying he misses you even though he’s the one who ended things and he’s the one trying to keep you from being happy.

He doesn’t get jealous of every single guy you talk to and yell at you when he’s mad. He doesn’t get progressively angrier because his yelling made you cry. He doesn’t shake the car and scream at you because you’re too afraid to unlock the doors.

He doesn’t lie to you and think that grand gestures make up for it. He doesn’t VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

get upset because “you’re not putting in the same effort.”

He doesn’t make you believe that you’re not enough for him by looking at other girls or talking to his exes when the two of you are having problems. He doesn’t make fun of you with them. He doesn’t laugh about you being a virgin. He doesn’t make you sound like the bad guy when he goes to his friends for advice.

Sometimes it’s better to be just one.

He doesn’t call you crazy or needy or clingy just because you have feelings and like spending time with him. He doesn’t call you a fucking cunt and then tell you that you take things too seriously. He doesn’t let you cry yourself to sleep every night.

He doesn’t touch you like that because he cares about what you want.

He doesn’t put his hands on you without first making sure you wanted him to. He doesn’t wake you up by kissing the back of your neck when he barely knows you. He doesn’t count “yes” as just the absence of “no.” He doesn’t assume no means you’re being coy. He doesn’t even know you that

well. Or maybe he knows you mean no, but he thinks he can change your mind. If I say, “You can’t change my mind,” he doesn’t think he can change my mind anyway. He doesn’t keep trying if I’m pushing against him and saying it’s not a good idea. If I say no, I mean no. If I don’t say anything or I’m not responsive, he asks me if I mean no.

Because he knows that what he wants is not more important than what you want.

But he does, really he does.

You don’t go to sleep every night wondering why you still feel so alone even though he’s right there next to you.

But you do.

But you’re still hopeful that you’ll find the right one. They can’t all be the same.

They can’t all be this awful. And you keep telling yourself it’ll be different this time.

And you try not to blame yourself but there must be something you’re doing wrong to find all these guys. But it’s not your fault. It is not your fault if he yells or puts his hands on you or makes you cry every night. You don’t deserve that. You are worth more than that. Don’t ever forget how horrible he made you feel. Move on, forgive him, but don’t let someone treat you like that again.

Or don’t forgive him because they don’t always deserve that. But you don’t need someone to love you because you can do a better job at that than anyone else ever could.

Sometimes it’s better to just be one.  41

Chance – Nikita Kalsi

S

econd chances. We’ve all had them.

Inevitably, we all will need them again.

Like us, you are far from perfect, and sometimes all we need is another opportunity to lessen the burden of our imperfections. There is nothing wrong with wanting to prove yourself to someone. We’d all like to think that in someone else’s mind we are a little bit special, worth a second thought.

We know that not every moment fits into story of lasting impressions, yet we still take chances. Sometimes we end up writing our happily ever after and sometimes we suit up

You’re carrying the magic wand, you are the only one that can fix this. just to fall flat on our faces.

Maybe you weren’t ready for that final exam, or you never meant to yell at him, or you really did just forget to call. Now you’re embarrassed, your ego’s a little bruised, and you’re wishing for one thing. A second chance.

ARTWORK ARTWORK BY

BY ANNIE ANNIE ZHU ZHU

42

You should have stopped to introduce yourself, you shouldn’t have left without saying goodbye, you were just a little too late this time. Now you feel as though you’ve fallen flat, you’re looking for redemption, you’re taking it personally and wishing for one thing. That second chance.

Enter your fairy godmother.

Scratch that.

Enter yourself. You’re carrying the magic wand, you are the only one that can fix this. Go ahead and give yourself the cure. Give yourself a second chance.

Once you’ve reached the point where you want another chance, slip on your flippers and dive right into it. Because if you’re asking for another chance, do you really have anything left to lose? Sometimes we just need to realize that second chances are someone else’s good faith reaching out to us and pressing the erase button on the mistakes we’ve made. They are the simple realization that regret doesn’t feel so wonderful and drowning in sorrow is not what the doctor ordered. Once you’re able to realize that this situation’s not getting better on its own, you can give yourself just what you need. Your second chances.

Walk up to him next time after class, burst back into her office and sell yourself for all you’re worth, run after what you left behind, run fast.

The amount of chance in a second chance is next to none. When you understand the consequences of an action, when you want to fix what you broke, when it really was not supposed to happen that way, acknowledge it. Don’t drown yourself in the draft special on a Friday night, creating enough delusional happiness to mask the pain. If you know what went wrong then you know that there is solution. It wouldn’t be called a problem if there were no answer. Go ahead and get it together.

If you want to be someone worth taking a chance on, once in a while you need to take a chance on yourself.  INCITE MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2015

I am not.

– Jason Lau

W

e go through life thinking that we are someone.

This one type of human that you happen to be. We have this idea of who we apparently are, how we are like, what we like, and what we want to do in our lives. For most, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what those criteria are, but this belief that we are this someone lingers around in our heads – deep enough to have it underscore the things we do every day, but also shallow enough to constantly probe our busy minds for an answer. Just that one answer.

Our own unique type of human is someone we put on every day and something we all supposedly show off to everyone around us.

“I am proud of who I am.”

Life is infinite. So why shouldn’t you be?

So we keep ourselves in this mold of what we think we are – in this box with dimensions measured entirely by us and specifications written on its surface in our own handwriting with our own blood. We are so engrained with this notion of who we are – something so permanent and so trustworthy, something always there to remind you that you are you, something that never fails to give you some comfort when everything else is just a blur. This you is just always there.

But there is just one.

There is just one you – but life does not come in singulars. Life is a tornado of events thrown at you regardless of criteria or dimensions or specifications. Life does not care for who you are.

Life is not just one. Life is many, wild, and unpredictable… life is infinite.

So why shouldn’t you be?

Why do we choose to remain singular in a world of plurals? Why are we just one when we can be so much more? Why do we define ourselves when we are simply undefined?

I am not one.

I can be one, but I can also be two. I can be two, but I can also be three. I can be three but I can also be free.

Free from the one I think I’m supposed to be.

Because if anything, I am not.

And you are not, either.  ARTWORK BY JASON LAU

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 5

43

WRITE ▪ EDIT ▪ DRAW ▪ PHOTOGRAPH ▪ DESIGN incite@mcmaster.ca