Archive for the ‘Writing Life’ Category
I shipped the babies off to their grandmother’s for a few hours, which left me free to catch up on my SONA case studies and watch one of my favorite movies ever:
STICK IT!
The beauty of STICK IT! is that you don’t have to be a fan of women’s gymnastics or teen movies to appreciate its content (though I will admit, it does help). Because at its core, STICK IT! is all about being alienated in a world where it’s less about who you are and what you know, and more about who you know and what you are.
Like when Haley gets a low score on floor not because of how she executed her routine, but because the judges are still annoyed with her for walking out on Worlds two years ago. Or when Mina gets blasted on vault because her bra strap was showing (allegedly), even though we all know it was because Burt Vickerman was her coach, and the judges are annoyed with him, too, for going rogue.
I guess this is something you can chalk up to life not being fair, but this past week it’s really gotten to me in a way I haven’t felt since that time in fifth grade, when Sarah Williams got chosen for the smart class and I didn’t, even though she totally plagiarized her scary story assignment and I made mine up from scratch. Then when I told Mrs. Sade what she had done and asked why – WHY? – I couldn’t go learn French and Latin and algebra like they did in the smart class, she wrote my name up on the board and told me I was being a sore loser, and it wasn’t Sarah’s fault I was stupid…that’s just how God made me.
Talk about devastating. I went through the rest of my grade school experience thinking, God made me stupid AND fat, and Sarah smart AND skinny? How the hell is THAT fair?
And after last week, that’s how I’m feeling again – stupid and fat. And stupid. Like it’s not bad enough that my hormones are so screwed up that my chin looks like a losing Bingo scorecard. That’s too easy. Let’s throw on a heaping helping of toxic advice and a double dose of kitten diarrhea!
YEAH!!
I realize at this point I’m being vague in an annoying sort of way, and I would elaborate if I knew how. Truth is, it’s not just any one thing that’s put me in a funk. It’s all the little things piled up on top of one another that do it: a critique that borders on condescending, a rejection (or two), a frustrating psychology professor, a history exam disaster, a kitten who won’t stop crying, the drink machine that won’t take my dollar…the list goes on and on.
It’s silly to be overcome by those kinds of things, because if you zoom out and look at them individually, they’re insignificant, like grains of sand compared to the entire freaking universe. But right now, they look big. And what’s more, they make me feel small. Like I can’t do anything right. Like everything I do is wrong. Like there’s no point in even trying anymore.
Like I’m stupid and fat.
And sometimes it’s hard to not throw in the towel, or worse, conform to what everyone else is saying is good, even though I can tell that it sucks. Big time.
Then I think about how at one point someone told a pre-Gaga Lady Gaga that she would never be Norah Jones, and I wonder if it was as funny then as it is now, because I doubt it was. Probably it hurt. A lot. Like she was doing everything wrong, just by being different.
And that makes me feel a little better, like maybe I’m not wrong at all. Maybe I’m just different, and someday other people will see that, too.
As for Sarah, I later found out that she wasn’t really as smart as she wanted people to think she was, and that her parents had donated a shitload of money to the school to secure her spot in the smart class. A few weekends ago, I saw her working the till at the Dollar Tree in Dandridge, and let me tell you, she looked more confused by the numbers on her screen than I did looking at my history exam this morning.
So now I’m thinking, maybe God has a sense of humor after all.
I was seduced by the library again.
That was ‘by’, not ‘in’.
Anyway, the other night Jinky and I were talking and I mentioned a story idea that I was making notes for. I try to write for at least an hour in the morning six days out of seven then I write a little at night if I can stay awake long enough. But I wanted to work on this new story without taking away from the time I allotted with the other current projects.
Writing at my workplace is out of the question. No matter if I sit in the kitchen or at my desk with my (pink) laptop, people feel perfectly comfortable sitting down and striking up a conversation or discussing a work issue. Never mind I’m on my time, not company time.
So I thought the ideal solution would be the public library. It’s barely five minutes away, I don’t know anyone there, it’s a wonderful building, and it’s guaranteed quiet.
Yeah, not so much on the last part. I appreciate the part about libraries needing to be community centers but … you can’t even get quiet in the quiet room. Mothers with herds of children stop to converse, complain, and set up playdates while their offspring stampede through. Retirees socialize and discuss health problems and the state of the world.
I sat in the genealogy room one day, thinking no one would be shaking their family tree at noon on a Tuesday. Except ten minutes into my writing, a woman came over and sat down across from me and blurted out an incredibly convoluted family history without pausing for breath. When she finally stopped after asking for research assistance, I said, “I don’t work here.”
The Current Periodicals Room – the loudest sound should be the rustling of newspaper pages. Except the elderly gentleman reading WSJ was apparently too deaf to realize that it was his phone that played “Fly Me to the Moon” at top volume. He glared at me and snapped, “Aren’t you going to answer that?” “Sure,” I said. “Hand it over.”
After that, I went to sit in my car. Which was good until the meter maid knocked on my window to issue a parking limit warning. I give up!
I attended a romance writers’ workshop this weekend and overall, it was good.
Of course, I ended up sitting beside a hypochrondriac, who told me every detail of her health issues despite the fact I hadn’t asked. I sat there and listened like a moron, which is par for my course. One day I will lose my temper enough to say “shut the hell up”. Until then, I curse my mother for drilling manners into me and curse other mothers for not drilling manners into their children. Miss Hypochondriac asked me a brief question about my writing (“Are you working on a story?” to which I replied “yes”) then turned the conversation back to herself and her problems. Except that’s not a conversation, it’s a monologue, and in some cases, it’s a purer form of torture than waterboarding.
But despite my neighbor, I enjoyed the workshop. Two speakers gave great presentations about characters and plotting and story ARCs, then a panel of editors spoke about current hot topics. (Vampires are still hot. The Russian mob, not so much.)
One funny thing is that the workshop was held in a library community room and when it got stuffy, the doors were opened. It was fun to see library patrons stop in their tracks upon hearing certain words, especially during a session about ratcheting up sexual tension. The eavesdroppers would peek in and see a room full of respectable ladies, one of whom was crocheting as she listened, and apparently decide their ears had deceived them so they would scurry past and we’d try not to laugh.
However, it prompted a discussion of using pseudonyms and if it was a wise choice to have more than one. The editors mostly agreed that having only one was best, because unless you cross-referenced your pen names and titles, you might not bring along some of your readers and end up weakening your brand. Most editors agreed that it you were embarrassed to use your own name on your work, your embarrassment would show through in the story and it wouldn’t be an enjoyable experience for anyone.
I respectfully disagree. I’m not embarrassed by anything I write but I have an unwieldy surname. Most people misspell it badly enough that it becomes an entirely different name; therefore a lot of people wouldn’t find my work unless they tried really hard, so I feel that would weaken my brand. And should I become so famous that I sign hundreds of books in one session, I need a moniker that’s easy to scrawl across the page.
Workshops. They always make me think big.
