The “Stranger Things” actress recently told New York Magazine that she doesn’t understand why there’s still a negative stereotype
surrounding emotional wellbeing. She also nailed how sexist attitudes further stigmatize women with mental health challenges.
“I’m so sick of people shaming women for being sensitive or vulnerable. It’s so bizarre to me,” she told the magazine.

see full article mental health and shaming women

“Stranger Things” season 2 will air in 2017, and it’s safe to say the Duffers will have plenty of surprises up their sleeve. The Return Of Eleven In ‘Stranger Things’ Season 2 Is “Up In The Air”

 

a meeting of minds * Winona Ryder * from INTERVIEW, November 1989

 

As the miniature Morticia of ‘Beetlejuice,’ the heroine of the controversial ‘Heathers,’ and Jerry Lee Lewis’ child bride in ‘Great Balls of Fire,’ Winona Ryder has shown a rare poise and versatility, becoming one of the busiest and most promising actresses in Hollywood. She will soon star with Jeff Daniels in ‘Welcome Back, Roxy Carmichael,’ and she is at work with Cher and Bob Hoskins in Frank Oz’s ‘Mermaids.’

Ryder’s godfather is ‘60s guru Timothy Leary who now designs computer coursewear that, “converts the classroom into an exciting game show” and has recently completed a screenplay, ‘The Amazing Dr. Know.’ “Winona’s parents, Michael and Cindy Horowitz, started the world’s largest collection of books and materials about the use of plants, foods, and drugs,” Leary explains. “Michael and I have worked together very closely for almost twenty years – he was my archivist and published a three-hundred page bibliography of my writings. He came to visit me in 1972, while I was in exile in Switzerland, and he had with him a photograph of Winona taken when she was about a week old. So I wrote an inscription on the picture welcoming a new Buddha to planet Earth.

The first time I met her she was perhaps seven years old. I visited her family’s commune-estate in Mendocino County. We walked hand in hand, and Winona said that she had wanted to meet me because she had heard that I was a mad scientist. I thought that was a pretty good description; I marked her as a comer right there. We’ve seen each other regularly since then. We used to go to Dodger games together – she and her father are great fans. About three years ago she asked me to be her godfather.” The following is Leary’s essay on his new role.

THE GOD PARENT

In the old days there was less menu choice of one’s life’s decisions. Marriages were arranged by family and church to make sure that offspring would remain within the flock. Selection of one’s religion was also prearranged. Soon after birth the newborn infant was rushed to church for baptism and enrollment in the familiar creed.

In our secular society the tradition of the God Parent seemed to be fading away like the myth of Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy or the Virgin Mother. Indeed, tin the Age of Coppola, the term God Father had taken on a sinister flavor. What reasonably good-natured adult would want to play the role of the dread Don Corleone in the overheated family drama?

These were my thoughts on the subject until a few years ago, when Winona Ryder made me an offer I couldn’t refuse: She chose me to serve as her God Father.

So I am here to cheer this institution of God Parent-God Child when it is arranged by freely consenting people who have reached the Age of Reason.

It is the duty of parents and guardians to rush around acting like family therapist, FBI agent, Mother Teresa, Tommy Lasorda, and the neighborhood savings-and-loan office. The duty of the teenager is precisely spelled out: to do everything conceivable to drive parents and guardians up the wall.

The God Father, however, has a role that is simple and simply divine: to be a friend and admiring student. The duty of the God Daughter is more complicated. It is her pleasure to entertain the G.F. and to educate him diligently about current events, new developments, hot happenings, and thus prepare him to deal with the mysterious future. I now feel sorry for any adult who does not have a supportive, caring God Child to act as guide and role model.

Winona has so many talents that I hope to emulate. She is modest, changeable, solid, witty-wise, thoughtful. And she’s full-tilt here-and-now: exuberant, intense, bouncy, passionate. Winona does her homework and comes fully prepared.

And so she arrived at my house for this interview. We sat on the patio at the stone table which my wife, Barbara, designed, overlooking the plains of Los Angeles. She has changed since our last meeting, two months ago. She is no longer the Tennessee thirteen-year-old of ‘Great Balls of Fire.’ She is a poised woman with bright-red lipstick, flaunting style. She helped me activate and test the tape, recorder, and we began a typical G.F.-G.D. conversation.

Stranger Things One of the summer’s runaway hits is Stranger Things, the new Netflix series that hit number 1 during the first season, and is about to be renewed. The story is about a 12-year-old boy whose sci-fi infatuation becomes all too real when a monster pulls him into an underground world called the Upside Down. Stranger Things references many of our favorite spooky 80s flicks like ET, Poltergiest, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Jaws, Star Wars, Aliens, Nightmare on Elm Street, Stand by Me, The Shining, and even Marvel Comic characters.
About Winona, her movies, and her activities here

 

Leary biscuit
From Wilipedia, the free encyclopedia

Do you wanna live forever?
60s wisdom included the health tips from Native Americans who lived to be a hundred and never had a sick day in their lives. Leary "tuned in" and adapted to the ancient American theory. A Leary biscuit is a snack consisting of a cracker, cheese, and a marijuana bud. It is heated in a microwave oven to activate the tetrahydrocannabinol [the active ingredient in cannabis] and cause a cannabit "high" in the eater. Timothy Leavy was reportedly fond of these concoctions, even in the later years of his life, and thus they are named for him.
See also: Alice B. Toklas brownie at The Zeppelin Diner