FogCon and writing

It's been eons since I went to a con. Last minute I decided to head on over to FogCon (www.fogcon.org). I was only able to attend for one day but it was worth the drive out to Walnut Creek to meet some fabulous people and learn some good stuff. Read on and benefit my dearies.

I hit part of the Occupy SF/F panel, Nalo Hopkinson's very fun & interactive presentation on children's games with Ellen Klages, an informative and supportive panel titled "You are Not Your Rejection Slips" and a panel on body image.

I have to say the "You are Not Your Rejection Slips" panel gave me warm fuzzies. It was nice to be in a room with other people who were writing which doesn't happen as often as I wish (I'm on hiatus from my writing group this semester). Hearing other writers talk about writing is like suddenly finding yourself in group therapy with other crazy people who don't think you are completely irredeemable while every non-writer acts as if you are, even if they love you. Non-writers do not want to hear about your plots, characterization, story arcs, your whinging, complaining and confusion because the words are acting differently on the page than the vision that is in your head and all of the myriad other writing blah-blah-blah's that our friends, loved ones, coworkers and therapists get deluged with. I'm guessing that it can be boring.
*My wife is now kindly and very firmly confirming that it can be boring.*
I don't blame her. I find it boring to listen to people obsess when I have no interest in their obsession. Seemingly, all most people who write become a bit obsessive over it. It's because it is so freaking hard to get it right! Well, it is for me, maybe it's easy for you but it's my blog dammit so I get to say it's hard for me.

Being in a roomful of writers was empowering. We were united in trying to get published, all of us were frustrated, disheartened and confused - strength in masses. The panel moderator was Cassie Alexander. The editors were John Joseph Adams (Lightspeed), Gabrielle Harbowy (Dragon Moon Press, http://www.gabrielle-edits.com/), and Christie Yant (Lightspeed). Cassie asked the editors one question that I have wondered about many times. Do editors actually read stories submitted by an author who has submitted previously and been rejected? The answer from JJA (John Joseph Adams) was yes, Lightspeed will read stories from people that have submitted hundreds of times even if they have rejected them previously. He said he always hopes that this story is the one that he gets to publish (it's happened several times before) and that as far as he was aware all editors of publications did. By the way JJA seemed like a genuinely nice guy. He went out of his way to say kind and supportive things. I'm sure he wouldn't accept a story if he didn't like it but I think that he tries to be fair and as considerate as possible about our babies that we throw to the wolves of possible rejection, which is really all I ask. Also, all of the editors on the panel said that they have had to reject well known authors - it really is about the piece, not the authors name. I imagine that that could sting for a published author. Rejection sucks for everyone regardless of experience.


Anyway, I've never submitted to Lightspeed but now I will as well as other markets. It was a great pleasure to meet Rachel Swirsky (seriously, a very nice person who was wonderfully informative and kind to this newbie) who told me about Ralan for spec fic markets (http://www.ralan.com/) and of course Duotrope (http://duotrope.com/) which is an amazing resource for finding markets for all kinds of writing. Duotrope is where I've found places to send poetry and literary fiction as well as spec fic. If you use Ralan or Duotrope to find markets please consider sending them a few bucks so that they can continue to help other writers. They spend a lot of time helping us, so give back please.

I had the great pleasure of getting to hangout with Charlie Jane Anders who did the best karaoke version of What is Hip? by Tower of Power that I have ever and probably will, ever see. It was epic.
It was also wonderful to get to meet Lisa Eckstein (http://www.lisaeckstein.com/), Juliette Wade (http://talktoyouniverse.blogspot.com/), Naamen Tilahun (http://naamenblog.wordpress.com/), Laurie Toby Edison (Body Impolitic: http://laurietobyedison.com/discuss/), Debbie Notkin, and Keffy Kehrli (http://kehrli.livejournal.com/) and the many, many other folks who I didn't get cards or info from but all of whom were full of the curiosity, kindness, imagination and intellectual force that make sci fi and fantasy conventions ridiculously fun.

Time is my most precious commodity

I had such high hopes that I would write daily.
I had it planned and scheduled which was painful for me as I hate/loath/am allergic to scheduling. I really wanted to make time to write though so I had a stern talking with my inner anti-time keeping device, just want to play Skyrim naked or read, inner child. I got her to agree that creating and sticking to a writing schedule was a brilliant idea that I would enjoy - and I did for all of one month. Then my classes entered a new phase in which I had to pay attention to them or suffer the consequences. My writing schedule sailed off like a cut-string kite.

I'm up to my eyeballs in school this semester. I haven't done any photography since Christmas. I've written one shitty first draft of a short story since school started and I feel like my neck is going to snap from jerking away from the ideas that roll with rhythmic inevitability through my brain trying to grow into time consuming to get down, stories or poems. The enormity of trying to memorize, understand, synthesize, and regurgitate the vast quantity of stuff I'm supposed to know for school jerks me the other way. I had to pick and school won. I have let myself write a little when I can and I promised myself this: Yamazaki whiskey if I do well this semester. I'm going to be going to graduate school some day so I have to be a good little student now while getting my BS and work my ass off to get good grades.

Since I don't want to loose the random ideas I have, I've started using Evernote (http://www.evernote.com/) to keep track of things that pop into my brain. It has been wonderful. I've kept notes on ideas for dialogue, plot, characterization, tidbits of research, overheard things I like, and  random pictures and links I come across that give me ideas. It's incredible and free. It syncs between my phone and my laptop and did I mention it's free? I highly recommend it as a great time and mental peace saver.

Strangely, I think this time has been good for my book. The ideas that I had that I wasn't sure of have crystallized or been tossed and the whole thing feels as if it will be less shaky and liable to fall over when I get time to actually put the rest of the words down. I seem to be acquiring something called "planning" which has always sounded like "scheduling" to me, so of course I hated it with a passion. However, I want to write well and while I've accepted that my first draft will be crummy, I do want it to get better with subsequent drafts, be enjoyable and tell the story that is becoming clearer in my brain every day.

I guess my inner child is growing to accept that constraints like restraints, can be fun when used with care - they can actually be quite satisfying.

Let yourself suck at writing and embrace being a beginner

Writing a book is an adventure. To begin with, it is a toy and an amusement; then it becomes a mistress, and then it becomes a master, and then a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster, and fling him out to the public.

– Winston Churchill

 I remind myself that I need to let myself suck at writing every time I hear some writer (usually on twitter #amwriting) say, "I just wrote 35 thousand words and I've got another 2 thousand planned out for this evening" and because I am not made of  Italian marble that lets everything roll of it, I think "Jeebus, I've never written that much in a day. How did I ever think that I could possibly do this. I suck!!" 

This is part of the reason I hate word counts. They make me feel like there must be something completely wrong with me because I can't do that. I then have to remind myself, yes, I can't do that now. I'm a beginner. If I continue to write maybe some day I will be able to do that. Maybe, but maybe not.

I'm working on my first book which will probably suck and that's okay, because I am a beginner. If it is only ever read by my wife because she loves me and I get to torture her consequently, that is okay. Because the next book or short story will be better from what I learned writing the first book.

We writers are often perfectionists, I certainly am. I want the exact right words to flow out of me like water, I want to always know where this story is going, I want pats on the back and permission to feel complete because I did it perfectly. I wrote the perfect sentence, short story, or book and everyone loves it because I am awesome. I've been working on the idea of giving myself permission to feel complete even if I don't get the exact right words, even if the story doesn't make sense in the first draft (the number of writers who do not write a shitty first draft is infinitesimally low according to my non-scientific survey of authors who have written about their writing processes) and I rewrite it ten times and although it's better it still isn't perfect. I have to consciously tell myself, "that's okay, next time will be better". I encourage you to do give this to yourself as well, whether it comes up for you while writing or trying to learn to play the guitar or at work. There is this toxic concept in our society that being perfect is healthy, it's not. What's healthy is to let yourself screw up and learn from it without judgement. Do this for yourself, do this for your family, do this for your coworkers and we'd all get along better and be more at peace with what we do.

There is a concept in Zen buddhism called shoshin which basically means beginner's mind. It's the idea that as a beginner we are open to the possibilities, we are untainted by experience and can try any old damn thing we please without preconceived ideas of how it will or will not work. I recommend for the new year that regardless of your level of writing experience you aim for shoshin - be a beginner. Being a beginner is actually a good thing.

Holidazed

I've fallen in love with the world again.
It's so fucking beautiful and so wrong, how can it can contain itself?

The soggy gray light is dripping on the incarcerated aluminum holiday bows. They are dying together in the cold winter air of San Francisco.

An origami man is folding into himself on the corner. He can't retain his shape as he rocks slowly, back and forth. The haphazard clumps of his brown hair match the desperation in his eyes - they are flying in all directions, together.

Coming Soon!

I'm working on some book reviews that I'll be putting up in the next few days as well as some short fiction. Stay tuned!

Simplified

My broken list is long - bones, feelings and insight. 

I live for the damages,  in breaking wrongness, sometimes we make right. 

Negative space defines just as much as the positive.

Love your dark and your light and treat yourself with kindness. 

The Angels are Singing

I knew a man once who called me Angel but only while I was sleeping on the couch that had lost its color before I had lost my virginity more than a decade ago.

I would pretend to be asleep to listen to his nonsense.

"Angel", I'd hear him tell our coworkers, "worked hard today, let her sleep. She looks so innocent don't she, when she's asleep? Soon as she wakes up though. Lord that mouth. But she's cute ain't she, like a baby tiger. Never know it's gonna claw you or purr."

Our coworkers would laugh and nod, "Uh-uh, Uh-huh".

"She's strong", his voice full of approval, "Lord knows, this world you need to be strong."

The coworkers would all nod, "Uh-huh, Uh-huh".

He had seizures. They would hit him and his body would drop to the ground and his eyes would roll in his head like a cheap carnival doll. They got progressively worse, lasting longer, happening more frequently - his own personal earthquakes that were gradually shaking his brain into smaller and smaller pieces. There was nothing the doctors could do.

I asked him what it was like to have a seizure, he told me that the heavenly choir was pouring over him like the flood, all he could do was try to swim cause all there was, was the singing of angels surrounding him as far as he could see, and all he could do was try not to slide under it because it held him like water, and tossed him around like a thought and he knew he could drown in it and there was nothing he could do but try to swim.

"Every time I get thrown farther. Sometime, it's gonna happen. I won't come back." I could hear the fear in his voice and all I could think was, what do you say when someone knows they're gonna die?

I asked him once for fun, what color is heaven? He threw his head back, his eyebrows rose, his face squeezed shut like a slammed door, and he nodded his head as if he was agreeing with some voice. "Heaven is the color of God's love".

I couldn't laugh at the thoughts of a dying man.

I figured if angels existed he would know.