JMeganSnow Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 Hello everyone, my name is Jennifer Snow. I'm a Data Entry Clerk at a Tissue Bank and I work at a spaghetti place a couple of days a week to help pay the bills. I'm also taking classes online towards a Liberal Arts degree. I've written two mercilessly bad fantasy novels and I'm working on writing some good ones just as soon as I can figure out how to go without sleep for more than two days at a time. A friend of mine introduced me to Ayn Rand's novels when I was in high school, around age 14 during a volleyball meet. I read all four of the major novels that year and I just couldn't quite make it through the "This is John Galt Speaking" speech. The concepts were so utterly foreign to me that I simply couldn't grasp them. I spent most of the next few years in the grip of major depression and, although I didn't really understand them the novels helped me a lot. I think if I had not had their powerful vision of life not as an endless series of compromises and delaying actions but as something wonderful and good I would have given up, shut my mind off, and died. In recent years I've been able to shrug off the mantle of depression and anxiety that's plagued me all my life, mostly because I've studied Objectivism more thorougly and developed an understanding of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KevinD Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 Hi, Jennifer. What a beautiful name. Thanks for sharing your inspiring story. It's so great to see so many WOMEN joining this site! Welcome all! Kevin Delaney Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMeganSnow Posted January 19, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 What a beautiful name. I didn't pick it but thank you! It was actually the most common girl name the year I was born. I find it somewhat comical that Jennifer translates as "White wave" considering what my last name is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Free Capitalist Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 Haha, oh if we could all pick our names! Anyway, welcome Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldsalt Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 Welcome to the forum, Jennifer. When I was a young adult suffering several devastating losses, someone gave me a copy of Atlas Shrugged. It saved my life. The only thing others were doing to try to help me was suggest that I go to church and pray. Boy, was Miss Rand a breath of fresh air. Unlike you, though, I loved Galt's speech and read it several times. You should pardon the expression, but it was a revelation! I look forward to your participation in the discussions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMeganSnow Posted January 19, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 I loved Galt's speech too, I just didn't have the mental faculties to comprehend it at the time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldsalt Posted January 20, 2005 Report Share Posted January 20, 2005 I loved Galt's speech too, I just didn't have the mental faculties to comprehend it at the time. Yes, depression makes oatmeal of one's brain. Or did you mean that you didn't have the mental faculties to understand it because you were only 14? Adolescence can be another form of "oatmeal for brains." That's usually due to the short-term mush whipped up by puberty (which is another form of mental illness ) and unavoidable ignorance. Thankfully, most people grow out of that fairly quickly. There are those, however, who never seem to grow out of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Posted January 21, 2005 Report Share Posted January 21, 2005 Welcome Jennifer! It funny - I bought Atlas Shrugged, a keen, young and niave teenager interested in philosophy and didnt read it for three years. I thought I needed a firework in my life, some spontaneity after years of institutionalization- so I got a one way ticket to India when I finished school and decided to travel. It drove me near crazy, I found myself sitting on a bus in northern India with no knowledge of where I was going and with the knowledge that I'd had no idea I'd be there the day before. A few months in an American approached me at breakfast in a Himalayan town - "Anybody want somthing to read??, I'll sell these cheap before I giv'em back to the shop...". I reply "What've you got?" , he throws two tattered books across the table, one of which is Atlas Shrugged - I pick it up and say "I know this book, I bought it but never read it", he replies "Oh shes an evil bitch that one" (liberals never the best sales people eh!). I bought it. I consequently came back and am now studying for a degree in Neuroscience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMeganSnow Posted January 21, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 21, 2005 Nice to meet you, Charles! I've done some traveling myself (in Europe, and all over the U.S.) and I well remember feeling adrift and lost and afraid. It was this feeling, I think, that led me to question the necessity of withering slowly away to a bitter old husk, drifting in nostalgia for days when I didn't know anything. Now, every time I learn something new I'm better than I was before. I look forward to the day when I can travel again. But I'm going FIRST class this time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidV Posted January 21, 2005 Report Share Posted January 21, 2005 Haha, oh if we could all pick our names! Anyway, welcome It's not hard - you just fill out a form and pay a fee. I've changed my first name twice - when I came to the States, and when I was 16. I also picked my middle name, since they didn't have them in the USSR. My current name means "beloved brave trader" - I think I can live with that. Oh, and welcome Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMeganSnow Posted January 22, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 22, 2005 I don't know that I would change my name. It's MY name. If I were to change it, I'd be constantly saying, wait . . . that's not me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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