You Are Your Mother's Only Son And You Are A Desperate One

Life continues to slip through my fingers and I continue to half-heartedly yet desperately grab for it, like a frenzied game show contestant.

Reading Rainbooooow

Don't take too long to think about it. Fifteen authors (poets included) who've influenced you and who will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than 150 seconds. 

1.  Dave Eggers

2.  Charles Bukowski

3.  Vladimir Nabakov

4.  Allen Ginsberg

5.  John Updike

6.  John Steinbeck

7.  Anton Chekhov

8.  Hunter S. Thomson

9.  Jack Kerouac

10.  Raymond Carver

11.  Plato

12.  Henry Miller

13.  Ralph Ellison

14.  Kurt Vonnegut

15.  Jhumpa Lahiri

What Is Art? Is Art, Art?

I'm going to give it a stab.  Here's my definition for what constitutes a higher form of art (completely made up):

Aesthetics.  Anything becomes an art form when it advances beyond traditional forms and meets or exceeds aesthetic expectations.  See individually subject to question.

According to Carissa Aguayo

"Yes.  You are special and different.  Just like everyone else."