Archive for » November, 2009 «
Dear Me,
Thank you for dying your hair back dark. Blonde is so not my color as you will come to realize years later. By the way, many, MANY people wanted to tell you the same thing but they decided to let you work out your “phase” on your own. Try not to hurt them when you get to that point. Just never, ever, go blonde again.
You only have 2 years left of high school. Just suck it up and you’ll be out and living in New York. Whatever you do, take the acceptance to Marymount on the Upper East Side. It’ll be bad enough when we’re attacked to have Mom and Dad spazzing out about not getting a hold of you. We don’t need either of them swimming their way to the island to make sure their daughter isn’t buried in a Pace classroom at the bottom of a Trade Tower.
Yes, you will eventually have sex. Again, just hold out another couple of years. Townies just aren’t your thing. The first guy won’t be either. Be warned. You will be bored. Have the remote control handy. Late night TV isn’t all that bad.
You will have fights with your best friends. More sucking it up here. Everyone will get over it and you will stay friends for many years to come. You’ll deviate from their norm. You’ll do your own thing as you are itching to do, and you won’t regret it in the slightest. Life does not begin with babies. Just remember that. Revel in the notion of being raised as an only child.
Most importantly, life will go on. You will branch out, and that bitch that ranked on you the most will gain 40 pounds and you will have just one chance to laugh right in her face. Take it. It will feel good. You will not regret it for the giant monkey will be lifted off your back.
Everything else you need to learn for yourself as I didn’t have myself writing to me when I was 16 (figure that one out). I didn’t have any sneak peeks into the future. I just had to grope blindly and hope for the best. There were really high ups and there there some pretty low downs but everything even outs and, eventually, you’ll get out of debt. But, again, it’ll be worth it, and you won’t regret it. Because you regret nothing.
D
If you’re going to chastise someone for their supposed spelling mistakes, please follow these simple instructions -
1. Make sure it was them that actually typed the offending words in question and it was not just a cut-and-paste job.
2. Format your chastising sentence correctly. Having a run-on with improper punctuation will only make you look moronic.
3. Proofread your Out of Office message before you leave for the day because when I see 7 typos in two sentences, I’m going to question whether English is even your first language or if you’re really a hillbilly with a first grade education in disguise. I will then throw it back in your face when a client comes back and starts correcting your Out of Office fuck-ups because you made yourself look like a complete idiot. Then I’ll show everyone and we will laugh at your expense. I will then forward the following video around the office to drive my point home.
You now, I’m getting really tired of people saying, “we’re writers, we should support each other” and then condemn other writers for saying anything even remotely negative about another author and/or their book(s). You know, if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all type of thing. You know what? Shut up. Because the way I see it, my negative review is support. One, I bought and read the book, didn’t I? So what’s the problem? Two, I’m exposing your work to the public. Any publicity is good publicity and all of that. And three, my version of support, if I ended up not liking a book, is pointing out what I felt didn’t work, mentioning what I think would, and pointing out at least one positive piece of the book because it’s got to have some merit, otherwise it wouldn’t have gotten published. How is that not support? Because I’m not throwing daisy petals around is means I’m not being supportive?
When I’m in book blogger mode, I’m not in writer mode. That’s why I removed book reviewing from this blog because things can cross and I’d much rather keep the two separate to stave off any kind of conflict of interest. While I may be a writer in my free time, that blog is about reviewing books, not about my writing. I’m not promoting myself as a writer. I’m promoting myself as a book blogger. My writing does not come into play. So what’s the problem?
People might say, “you wouldn’t want people saying those things about your work, it’s all about Karma” and to that I’d say, of course I would. Of course I’d want to know if people liked or didn’t like my book and why. Why wouldn’t I want to know that? And why would I hold it against a fellow writer for expressing their feelings about my book? They buy books too, just like everyone else, and they’re entitled to their own opinions. Now if they went on and compared their work to mine and called mine shit and their’s is so much better blah blah blah, that’s a different story. I’ve yet to see that in review format. I don’t feel a need to take someone’s opinion away from them because they do the same thing I do.
I just don’t get it. Yeah, I understand when I say something negative about a book, especially if I really rip into it, it can reflect back on the agent and editor of that very book and in turn effect me in a negative way when it comes to querying. But in that same vein, am I entitled to like every single book on my agent’s client list, or every book my editor has put out, or every book the publisher as a whole has put out? Let’s get realistic here, ok? No, I’m not going to voice my opinion on something out of the clear blue with someone like an agent but chances are, if I’m querying an agent, I’ve liked at least some of the books they’ve put out, otherwise I wouldn’t be querying them. But it’s not just reasonable for me to like all of them.
And to that people would say “Google! They can find you by Google!” Good luck with that. You’d have to really, really try to link this blog with my book blog. Or just know my handle on AW. But even then, if I were confronted with something, I’m not about to deny it. I own every word I say on the internet. I wouldn’t say anything anywhere on the internet I wouldn’t say to someone’s face. Of course I am a professional person and I understand the limits of certain situations and I’m not about to act like a feral chimp and swear like a sailor in a business meeting but if the same situation would arise in person as it does on the internet, I’d say the same thing in both places. It’s a good credo to live by. That way you won’t end up with your foot in your mouth. At least not the whole foot, anyway.
At the end of the day, while many people call themselves writers, they’re still consumers too. And while I don’t think having a blog is any kind of right or entitlement, people do have them and they’re entitled to voice their own opinion on their own blogs and you’re just as entitled to not read it. I don’t think writers should be held to any higher standard in this case. If they understand the potential repercussions of their words (and I know published authors are in far different positions compared to someone like me), what’s it to anyone else? I don’t think a writer should be shunned for voicing a dissenting opinion on a product they bought that they were dissatisfied with. Substantiate the claim and you’re good to go.
Look, I work in insurance and I sure as HELL feel absolutely no obligation to support any of those asshats at AIG simply because we work in the same industry and have the same jobs. Why is writing any different. Give me a break.
I just started writing a Labyrinth fanfic (can you blame me? I’ve been inundated) and when I was posting it on fanfiction.net, I noticed a category labeled Hurt/Comfort. This was on both sites I posted at. Now it’s been a while since I’ve posted a totally new story anywhere and have had to really look at the categories but what the hell is this? Is it code for emo?
From what I remember, that used to be the same thing as drama since, you know, that’s all it is. A character suffers from something and usually gets comforted at the end (or at various points in the middle). How’s that different from drama? Is it an entire fanfic of nothing but moaning and whining about whatever in the character’s life and they’re constantly getting pet by another character? Oh god, how droll. And annoying.
Does anyone else know anything about this particular category and what it actually means? Because I’m lost.
I’ve been on a Labyrinth bender for the past few days (no excuses, David Bowie is just one giant bucket of crotch monster sex) and it’s got me thinking on the concept of living in a fantasy world. In the movie Sarah, a fifteen-year-old girl, is firmly planted in her own fantasies and I believe that any adult looking at that would question her on some level, be it her maturity, her mental stability or whatever. Within the context of the movie, she appears to have a firm grasp between fantasy and reality and if you read the novelization (which I was lucky to obtain many moons ago, yay for eBay!), it further explains that this fantasy world desire is fueled by her want to become an actress.
But is living in a fantasy world all that bad?
I take a look at my own life, at 26, and while I don’t play dress-up in the park, I would think the stories that I write, plus the dreams I give myself, would have me in flighty school right next to Sarah. Where’s my Goblin King, dammit? But is this really so bad? Because I write this fantastical stuff about fairies and other worlds and gateways and such, does that really make me flighty? Does it make me yearn to live in another world entirely (is Jareth involved?)? Does it somehow make me less mature or push me further into my hermit status?
I guess what I’m asking is, what is wrong with living in a fantasy world? If your feet are planted firmly on the ground, what’s wrong with walking around with your head in the clouds? What’s wrong with escape? Am I immature because I day dream of worlds not my own or write stories where dogs turn into pedantic shitheads? I like having fantasies and I really don’t see myself growing out of them any time soon. I like to pretend I can escape. I’m sure a psychologist would see me as having unrealistic expectations and attempt to medicate me in some way. But I’m not seeing Hoggle pissing in my hedges and I’ve never been bitten by a fairy (yet) so . . . what’s the big deal?
Let me have my dreams, man. I like them too much to give up.
Ok, I just realized that I really do have a decent amount of stuff to talk about on my blog but if I don’t post RIGHT NOW my sieve of a brain is going to forget. So here I go.
It appears that a current trend now is putting a soundtrack to your novel, and then possibly “casting” it. Am I the only one that doesn’t do this?
One, I write in silence so I don’t have any music that actually inspires the work that I write. And two, I just don’t correlate music to my work after the fact. I mean, it takes a lot of brain power for me to sift through songs and attach them to my work, mainly because I can’t remember anything!
I’ve only had one piece of work where the soundtrack wrote itself and it was for a piece of fanfiction. The music fell into place and it was perfect. Everything else? I’ve had to spend the time seeking out songs, listening to the lyrics, maybe they fit, maybe they don’t. I just don’t like wasting that kind of effort and for what? So my story has a soundtrack? Yeah, it can be fun but . . . what’s the point? I blame Stephenie Meyer for popularizing this because she did it for her pieces of trash books. She is to blame for all the evil in the world.
And as for casting, I see that as another wasted effort. Sure, it’s fun . . . but why? I mean, I can see how it would spurn the creative process but I don’t know about you, but my characters look like themselves, not any actors or actresses. Yeah, every once in a while I’ll come across a relatively unknown, or not crazily publicized, actor and think he’d be great in a role for one of my characters. But other than that, I can’t put a face to a character that already has a distinct face. They’d be nothing more than a substitute and I’m afraid my characters would hurt me if I chose wrong.
Do you do either of these things? What do you get out of it? Does it benefit your work at all or is it a kind of procrastination method for you? Or is it just something fun?
What aspects of a relationship do you require in order to consider someone a friend? Personally it requires years of knowing. I befriend people easily enough but thanks to a good burn from a former long-time friend, I no longer allow people into my inner sanctum without a thorough screening. I have to gauge their reactions to things, trickling information about myself to them in order to see if they’re going to accept me as me or if they’re just another fraud. Over time, the relationship builds and, if no signs of mutiny are found, I start to consider a person my friend.
Granted there are exceptions to every rule. There are just a few people that you know, that your gut tells you, that are damn cool people and not to miss out. I listen to that because it’s almost always right (I would say always right but seeing as it’s a human reaction, and humans are fallible, always right is an impossibility by nature).
Online friendships have quickly replaced those of a pen pal relationship. And I’m not talking about the 1001 MySpace friends a person may have but never talk to. This is the deeper relationship. The connection is instantaneous, usually found by some sort of commonality, like a fandom. Just like in tangible form, people gravitate towards each other in evolving cliques. You get to know these people, you form bonds with them. You discuss things with them that you wouldn’t tell your tangible friends, maybe because you find some kind of comfort from behind a computer screen. You’re not entirely vulnerable. Or are you?
When you talk to the same people online over the course of a few years, it’s hard to discount the friendship that’s formed there. People would argue that “it’s not real” because “you don’t really know those people, you’ve never met.” Fair enough, but tell that to the people that “knew” Ted Bundy. Get my drift? You can be just as duped by someone in your physical face as you can by someone that you’ve never met on the tangible plane, just on the internet one.
And that’s why it’ll sting just as bad to get stabbed in the back by an online friend as by someone you’ve known for just as long in the flesh. The bond that you thought you’d had, formed over multiple years, was broken, probably because the other party didn’t feel the same, or felt that the friendship was somehow more frivolous, not as weighty, because you’ve never met. Sure, it might be somewhat easier to get over because you just can delete that person from your friends list, stop visiting the same forums, ignore their instant messages, and pretend like they never existed because you never did meet them. It doesn’t take the stinger out, though.
You’ll still have that tiny scar, the one that’ll chip away at your trust of other people just a little more, leaving you more guarded than you were before, a little less trusting. To the other party, perhaps they felt it was worth it. They got what they wanted. The thing is, your online persona can be a real good indicator of how you act in the flesh. And if that’s how you treat people online, you’re not the type of friend I’d want to have at all.
Just because your internet friends are relatively faceless, you’ve never shared a hug or a handshake, doesn’t make them less of a person. If you want to be a sleazy bitch and leech what you will off of people regardless of what it does to them, that’s your problem and Karma will be knocking at your door when you least expect it. I’m sure you’ll wonder why but that’s to be expected. You’re the reason why the internet is the cess pool that it is.
There’s no respect for your fellow human beings. There’s no courtesy. There’s only every man for himself, regardless of any semblance of relationship that might have been forged. Because at the end of the day, you can just turn your computer off and ignore it all as if it never happened. But it doesn’t mean you’ll escape Karma.
I guess the moral of the story is to be a decent human being online and off. Treat people how you want to be treated and all that jazz. I would have thought that would have been “Parental Education 101″ but either someone failed or the internet took it away. Either way, only you can fix it.
