Obviously you know how I feel about the Fuckwit winning.
But that’s not what I’m going to talk about.
Let’s talk about other writers, other artists, other musicians. The creative people out there who inspire us, entertain us, move our spirits.
I’m looking pretty far ahead at the moment. I dearly hope that I am 100% wrong in feeling this way, but I would not be the least bit surprised if over the next four years, life for creative people starts getting harder. And that life for people who want to be creative — the students and the kids who dream about being writers, artists, knitters, sculptors, musicians and so on — gets harder as well.
You already know how I feel about this; it’s always aggravated and annoyed me that the arts is always the last on the budget list and the first to get axed when the economy starts tanking. You can get financial help if you’re a football or basketball player, but you’re not worth much if you sit around trying to create something (that is, of course, unless you create something that’ll make tons of cash for everyone). Too many people I know are held back from doing what they do and love best because of the Real Life of having to get a secondary job to supplement their income.
I should know. I’m one of them. Sure, my wife and I are reasonably okay financially, but if I could contribute as much to our combined income using just my writing, I’d drop my Day Job in a heartbeat.
This is precisely why I love this recent vibrant era of DIY creativity. Self-publishing, pop-up galleries, personal online stores, webcomics, boutique startups, Bandcamp. It’s more, a LOT more than saying to hell with the establishment, more than saying ‘wouldn’t it be fun to put on a show in the barn’. It’s saying “I know exactly what I want to do with my life, and I’m going to make that a reality.” It’s not saying ‘fuck the rules’, it’s completely rewriting them.
So.
I ask all of you now, do me a solid:
Look at your social media timelines. Look at those webcomics you read every day. Look at those bands whose music you download from Bandcamp. Look at that necklace or pair of earrings you bought off Etsy. Look at those artists whose painting you picked up from their tiny booth at the local pop-up gallery down the street. Look at those creative people, and realize that this, their creative work is what they do best. This is what makes them happy. This is what lifts their spirits. Your purchases and downloads and reviews are there to say “I love what you created.”
Do me a favor: in the next four years, if any of them have a Patreon, are running a Kickstarter, or are doing some kind of of fundraising so they can stay in business doing what they do and love the most in their lives, please donate. Even if it’s five dollars a month.
What you’re giving them is more than money. You’re giving them a chance to live the life they’ve always wanted to live. And that is one of the best things you can do for someone.
*Note: – Yes, my subject line is in Anjshé. It means “brothers and sisters.”
It’s probably obvious by now that I don’t write about politics in my fiction, at least not as a major plot point. [Governmental shenanigans do make a few cameos in the Bridgetown Trilogy, but they’re not used for political intrigue. It’s used to show how bureaucracy and adherence to rules over logic can cause a hell of a lot of headaches.]
That isn’t to say that I haven’t come close to writing a few politically-tinged stories. The close I ever got to doing so was an short story idea I’d called “Noah and the Schoolyard,” in which the titular character witnesses a breakdown of order during recess, in which several cliques are formed and eventually start to fight each other. It’s a too-obvious allegory of the present political weather and I found myself really not wanting to write it after maybe a few hundred words. An interesting idea, but something I know I’d hate writing, let alone reading later on. Lesson learned.
This also ties in with my decision during the last election cycle to disengage myself publicly from the peanut gallery. I’d be contributing little except more white noise to whatever was already out there. I have my opinions (and they’ll still leak out occasionally on Twitter if I’m all het up about something in particular), but for the most part I keep them offline now.
Are there any other subjects I won’t/can’t/would rather not write about? Sure. That’s not to say such things are beneath me, of course. My main reason for not writing about certain subjects is simply a lack of interest in wanting to do so. [This does not include stories or plots about gender or race — I’m interested in them, I just don’t want to write them half-assed. I haven’t used them as plot points, but I have tried to be inclusive to some degree.] I don’t often write what I love reading. I’m fascinated by hard SF like Cixin Liu’s current trilogy, but I can’t write that genre to save my life so I’m not going to try.
I guess what I’m saying here is that I know my boundaries. I’m not beholden to them, and if I so chose, I could figure out how to move beyond them. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I taught myself early on not to hold back, either. There are a few scenes in the Trilogy where I pushed myself past my normal comfort zone, because it was needed in the story. But I wouldn’t do it if there was no reason for it.
Now–on that note, I’ve already voted via early ballot here in San Francisco this past weekend, so all I have to do now is wait out all the damn robocalls that are flooding my answering machine and the fliers that I’m sure even the mailperson hates at this point, and let Tuesday do its thing. I’m not sure if I have the stomach to sit through the coverage tomorrow night (or to read all the live-tweeting for that matter), but we shall see.
[And for the record, if it isn’t already obvious, I’m definitely 100% With Her. I have some…issues with Trump, which I’d rather not go into here.]
See, I’m not entirely sure what I should be posting about. I’m worried that I’m starting to blog the same things over and over again. On the other hand, I’m at the back end of the Bridgetown Trilogy project, so I’m worried I’ll run out of fresh blog ideas. I JUST DON’T KNOW WHAT TO WRITE, DAMMIT.
See, I’m writing this at 7:30 on a Sunday night, and thanks to my horrible homework habits as a teen, this means that I’m making a right hash of this entry. Instead of focusing on writing something of interest, I’m thinking of what my Day Job workload will be like now that I’m back from vacation. I’m thinking about what I’ll need to do for most of November since A will be away on her own work-related trip during that time. Half of me is thinking, technically…I did say I’d return in November, but tomorrow’s October 31, so I don’t really need to write this. The other half is thinking, WILL YOU JUST STFU AND WRITE THE DAMN THING ALREADY?
So let’s pull ourselves together here a bit, shall we?
Don’t get me wrong…my writing habits are a hell of a lot better than they used to be. I’ll give myself a bit of a pass tonight because this was my first day back from a week-long trip (and a night flight that got us back to our apartment near midnight). I spent most of Sunday afternoon cleaning up a few hundred personal and work emails. We had to do some grocery shopping today, considering the refrigerator was embarrassingly bare. And the weird San Francisco weather was sunnycoldwetwarmovercastrainywho the hell knows and the humidity gave me one hell of a migraine. Not to mention the irritation of the recent news cycles. So I’ll forgive myself for being half-assed today and slipping into distraction mode. My brain has no idea what time or day it is right now.
That said…
What usually happens come Monday morning is that I’m rested up, focused, and ready to go. The frustration and the stress of Sunday night has been dropped and forgotten. What remains is renewed dedication to forge ahead and a bit of embarrassed acceptance that all this stress was a bit of a waste of time.
Hey gang! Sorry to let you down, but both blogs are going on a brief vacation for a few weeks.This next week is probably going to busy, between Day Job stuff and preparing for an actual trip (we’re heading back to New England to visit friends and family).
We’ll be back fresh and ready to go in November! Until then, don’t eat too much Halloween candy!
Not the one I worked at, but very similar in size and shape.
It occurred to me that twenty years ago as of the 23rd of September, it’s been twenty years since I’d started what would be one of my favorite jobs ever. Never mind that it was a fifty-mile, hour-long commute one way. Never mind that it didn’t pay enough for me to quickly get caught up on all my bills.
Dude: I was working in a record store. That’s all that mattered.
But I’m not going to go into detail about the store too much here; I’ll be doing that over at Walk in Silence tomorrow.
No, instead, I’ll talk a little about the food court, which was across the way from my store.
Solomon Pond Mall food court: where I had my initial interview, where I ate far too much fast food, and where I wrote a novel.
The mall was built around 1995 into 1996, so it was still shiny and new when I started working there. HMV was the first and only music store there at the time –not to mention this was before the file-sharing boom — so in those few years I worked there, we did pretty good business. We were in a good spot as well, so kids were always stopping in on their way to meet their friends elsewhere.
The last time I was at that mall was ten years ago, when we went to visit a few people in the area and had some time to kill. It hadn’t changed in the six years since I’d left the job, other than that the store closed up in 2001 and a Hollister was put in its place. A brief visit to the mall’s website shows that a lot of the original stores are still there.
HMV was the first long-term job I started after I moved back from my ill-fated stay in Boston a year before. After the short-term stay at the Leominster Sony theater, a six-month stay at WCAT, and a temp job at my mother’s bank downtown, I had to get hired somewhere, most likely out of town. I loved my hometown, but I’d long grown out of it. I needed to figure out a way to live in the larger world.
The western wing of the mall, looking east. There was a Waldenbooks just out of shot to the right. My store was to the left of that ‘Food Court’ sign in the distance.
Writingwise, I’d kind of dried up a bit. The process of writing True Faith had stuttered to a halt for personal reasons. I’d given up trying to rewrite the Infamous War Novel by this point, having finally trunked it. The songwriting and the poetry were drying up as well. It definitely wasn’t that I’d given up…it was that I had nothing to write about.
When I started the job at HMV, I wasn’t exactly sure how long it would take me to get there and back (even though I’d timed it during my initial interview in mid-August), so I would make it a point to get there with time to spare. My hours were from opening to late afternoon: somewhere around 9 to 5. Eventually I timed it so I’d get there about an hour to a half-hour early. I’d sit out in the food court with another coffee and relax. No stress when I started the job proper, then.
It didn’t take long for me to realize this was a perfect time to do some writing.
By late 1996-early 1997 I was out there every morning, working on something. My usual spot was the table closest to the store. [In the food court picture above, it would be right in front of that Dunkies at the far right. I chose that one deliberately so I would see the store’s lights go on when whoever opened got there before me, signalling it was time for me to clock in.]
Similar tables and chairs to the ones I used to sit at. I remember that wave pattern well. The zipper of my jacket would always get caught in those damn chair backs somehow.
I started The Phoenix Effect on 9 March 1997 at that table. A number of personal and creative events had taken place between the start of my job and that date, and that morning I chose to start a completely new story. I had no idea where I was going with it at first, other than the fact that it picked up where I’d left off with the spiritual/new age story ideas of True Faith and expanded on them significantly. It would be less dystopian, that was for sure.
Soon I was writing three to five handwritten pages a day before I started the job. I timed it so I’d get those words done, skip out for a quick smoke (a bad habit I’d picked up in college a few years previous), and then head off to my job.
After about a month of that, I realized it would probably be for the best that I start transcribing all this new work so I could start editing and revising it. I’d already moved my computer downstairs to the basement of my parents’ house and was already working on other transcription projects and whatnot. It seemed like the right thing to do.
The Belfry, circa 1998, with the hand-me-down Windows 95 computer (my second one). The writing nook was named so because of a bat problem one evening. Note the various snacks, notebooks, music, and other distractions nearby. Not shown: my addiction to playing FreeCell before I started a writing session.
By late 1997 and into early 1998, I was finishing up the handwritten version of The Phoenix Effect and working on a good solid revision, and by the end of that year I was ready to try my hand at submitting it to agents and publishers. I was also working on a sequel during my morning mall sessions. And I’d kept up with the publishing field as I went along. I knew what I was doing, and what I wanted to do.
This was the first novel since the IWN that I’d completed and submitted back in 1987, so I considered all this a pretty damn good milestone. Even as TPE was rejected left and right (and for good reason), I knew then I had a chance of making this a lifelong career.
I knew I was a writer at that point.
Alas, by early 2000 the job had become unbearable due to the change in management, hierarchy and schedule. I still made it a point to work on my writing on a daily basis, but it had become close to impossible to keep the same writing habits I’d had just a few years earlier. The most I could do is head down to the Belfry every night and work on revisions. I became stubborn about it. I would not give this up.
By autumn 2000, I’d quit that job and started a new one on the other side of the state. It was a shorter commute (thirty miles instead of fifty), the pay was better, and the schedule was a hell of a lot more stable. By early 2001 I’d switched to first shift, which let me out at 2pm. I had the entire afternoon and evening to write.
And write I did. And I’ve never stopped since.
Spare Oom, 25 September 2016 — still writing, still listening to tunage, still snacking, still distracted.
Twenty years later and that novel went through numerous revisions and morphed into a trilogy and an expanded universe. My music now comes to me from streaming radio stations, ripped cds and downloaded mp3s, and is all stored on two tiny external hard drives each about the size of an index card. I work from home and my commute is one room over. I’ve self-published two books of the trilogy, with the third on the way.
I still think about that store from time to time. I still consider it one of my favorite jobs ever, even if it was retail. Even near the end, when my manager and I weren’t getting along. Being surrounded by music all day kept me happy and entertained.
And most importantly, the job helped me create a solid and dependable writing schedule, and it helped me prove to myself that I could balance a Day Job and the Writing Career at the same time with minimal issue.
Without that, I’m not entirely sure where I’d be in my writing career today.
These past few days have been uncharacteristically warm here in San Francisco. On Sunday it hit 88° F, which is far higher than we here in the Richmond District are used to on any given day, even in the height of summer.
These are the days when I’m just as happy hiding in the cool of our apartment, working on whatever writing project I happen to be dealing with. Back in my Belfry days, I’d hang out down there because my family’s basement was the coolest part of the house, considering it never got any sun except at the end of the day. I loved hanging out down there during the summer, listening to tunes and writing away.
Warm days at Arkham West (aka our first apartment in North Beach) were another problem entirely. Due to our bay windows we’d be getting sunlight all day long and it would get quite toasty if we didn’t close the blinds. I’d make do with writing on the PC, but some days I’d move to the couch and write there.
Here in Spare Oom, though? Perfect weather. The one window faces north so we don’t get direct sun at all, just the breeze off the ocean. And we’ll sometimes get some absolutely gorgeous sunsets as well. It never gets hot or muggy in this room. Sure, it’ll get cold in the winter, but not enough to drive me from getting work done.
I’m usually not one for writing sessions outside of the home, though. I just feel kind of weird taking up space in a café or a bookstore for hours on end. It’s not about other people watching me write…it’s more that I’d feel like I’m hogging a seat that one or more people could possibly use instead during the time I’m there. [That, and I’m usually there for other things, like buying coffee or books. I don’t feel as bad if I’m sitting somewhere going over the book pile and debating which ones I’ll buy.]
Still, I make sure I get out and enjoy the air now and again. A. and I try to make a point of going out for a walk on the weekend, even if it’s up to the brewpub at the other end of Clement Street. We’ll take a walk in Golden Gate Park or the Presidio, both a short walk from our apartment. We’ll head over to the gym and work out for a bit (during which I’ll be listening to my mp3 player and working out plots in my head while on the treadmill). We’ll head somewhere for brunch or a late lunch on the weekends as well.
As much as I’d like to be one of those writers hanging out in their workspace for hours on end, writing thousands of words and working on everything under the sun, I do need to exit the house now and again. Just to remember there’s a world out there.
So that said, we did manage to get outside and walk a bit before the heat and humidity got the better of us and we went back into hiding in the apartment to watch football. To prove this, I took a panoramic shot from our nearby vista point, Land’s End Trail. It was so clear we could just about make out Point Reyes in the far distance (it’s around 50 miles north of us, and just about barely visible in the far left horizon in this picture).
View from the Eagles Point lookout on Land’s End Trail. I love that this is in our neighborhood.
Day Job system crashes. Unending emails to work through. Client fires to put out. A drive across the Bay for an office visit. I missed a few writing days. I’m late in getting this post out. I’m just about done, and it’s not even noon on Friday yet.
BUT.
I gotta do it. No way around it.
I gotta write. I can take a rest day every now and again, but I gotta pick it up again when I’m ready.
Perseverance. A stubborn will to hit my deadlines.
Even if this post is a half-assed one with yet another anime picture as the header. Heh.
Still.
Gotta get my work done.
Despite all the roadblocks. Despite the raving case of the Don’t Wannas. Despite really needing a beer right now because the Day Job’s been that much of a pain in the ass.
One thing I always need to remind myself is that I’m not in a race with other writers to get my work out. Sure, I had that feeling way back in the day, back when I as naive enough to think that my manuscripts were good enough to warrant attention. I thought the turnaround was super-quick, that I’d have my byline and my comp copies in my palms within a few weeks. [Reality hit me pretty quick and hard, then.] And I still get that twitch of envy when I see writers I know personally or online, releasing new works while I’m still languishing.
Every writer gets that feeling. You want to be in the same race as everyone else, wanting to keep up and be One of the Gang. But everyone in that gang is already miles ahead of you, already known to readers, physical copies of books in hand, doing the signings and the readings at the conventions and book stores. It’s enough to make you wonder if you’ll ever catch up.
Well, here’s the thing: it’s not a race. Not unless you want it to be. You might give yourself a hard deadline like I did, to get that book out and away by a specific date, to have that physical copy in your hand (even if it is a galley or an ARC). But you’re not racing the other writers. Far from it.
They’re running just as hard as you are, tripping up at the same points you are, maybe even making it up as they go along like you are. Their race is not about who gets there first across the finish line, or who gets there the fastest. Their race is about finishing the race. To them — and indeed, should be to you as well — this race is a marathon. Running those twenty-six-point-two miles of hard work, revisions, edits, re-edits, re-revisions, meetings, sales plans, working on other projects in the interim, and aiming for that final goal of completion.
In the end, the only race in writing and publishing that a writer should be concerned with is a deadline. I had to remind myself of this for quite a long time, and once I finally got over that, I no longer felt frustrated that I was getting left behind, or annoyed that I was taking far too long to get my own work done.
One of the best ways I learned that is to take part in the writing community. I’m still a solitary writer that hasn’t joined a local writer’s group (and I kind of feel more comfortable that way — that avenue is completely up to you whether you want to follow it or not)…but I talk with other writers online all the time, I’ve met up and become friends with writers both beginner and pro. Once I came to the conclusion that we’re all in the same boat, that we’re all slightly frazzled and overworked but still loving what we’re doing, none of us are truly left behind. A lot of us support each other at all levels, because we know just how hard the job can get.
We’re all running, but we’re all running together.
I seem to be in one of those moods again. You know the ones: where suddenly feel the need to change everything up, try something new (or bring back something old after I’ve freshened it up a bit). I think it’s because I’m on the back end of the Colossally Long and Really This Shouldn’t Have Taken This Damn Long project of releasing the Bridgetown trilogy. I’m definitely seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and it looks quite sunny out there.
Which reminds me — the layout of this blog is rather dark, isn’t it? I mean, I like the look of it myself, but I feel the color scheme is starting to outgrow its usefulness. Book 3 is starting to kick up dust on the horizon on its way towards release (still looks like it’s going to be either very late this year, or possibly early next year, by the way things are going), and it’s got a much brighter outlook.
I’m thinking that in the next few weeks, I may change up the site here, make it a bit more warm and inviting. I’ve got the next few weekends wide open, so maybe some Sunday I’ll pop in and open up the shades!
*
I read a lot of webcomics first thing in the morning while having my breakfast and booting up the Day Job laptop, and I’ve noticed a very weird trend. In particular, it’s a trend dealing with the balance between the creator’s vision versus reader expectation. I first noticed this during my weekly reading of the Naruto manga series as it was being uploaded to various comic sites, in which a certain subset of fans were getting increasingly upset that the creator, Masashi Kishimoto, was driving the plot where they didn’t want it to go. A few fans ragequitting the series towards the end (which was nearing 700 chapters by that time!) in protest. Others going on lengthy Tumblr diatribes as to why Kishimoto was flat-out WRONG for writing his story the way he did.*
Fast-forward to the other day, when two webcomic artists, Mildred Louis (Agents of the Realm, a wonderful take on the magical girl trope) and Pascalle Lepas (Wilde Life, an incredibly inventive supernatural/horror story) both started tweeting about readers who have recently contacted them, either through DM, site comment or email, letting them know how much they like their work…except that if you fixed X, Y and Z, and did A, B and C instead, it would be so much better.**
Dude. Really?
I could never quite understand why some fans would do that, especially to creators who are releasing their work on their own and not through any publisher or production company. Would you contact your favorite band’s lead singer on Twitter or Facebook to say you loved the new album but Track 6 sucks ass because it’s a bit too long and someone hit a bum note?
Why would you cross the line from appreciative fan to self-appointed Subject Matter Expert on someone else’s creation? Why would you want to? There’s obsession (like my discography completism, for instance) and then there’s obsession (NO NO! You can’t write *my* babies into a corner like that!!), and the second kind is really kind of creepy.
I’ve seen writers get this a lot too. I’ve gotten it a few times. Well-meant criticism, but really…it’s our creation, not yours. We’re trying to tell you a story we think you’d enjoy. You’re like Vern from Stand By Me, continually interrupting Gordie’s story about Lard-Ass Hogan and just pissing everyone else off.
Constructive criticism isn’t always about saying ‘you did X, Y and Z wrong; here’s how to do it better.’ It’s definitely not about saying ‘this wasn’t written the way I wanted it to be written, therefore it’s wrong.’ And despite your apparent knowledge about what makes a good story, you’re forgetting the most important part: you’re speaking from opinion, not experience. Your criticism isn’t helpful; it’s coming across as pedantic and selfish.
If you’re a professional editor at one of the major publishing houses? If you’re a pro artist who’s worked on your craft for years? Sure, that’s different. We all like hearing from the pros on what we can do to make our creation that much better. But if you’re just a Fan With A Very Important Opinion, not so much.
I know, I know…touchy subject. Just something I had to get off my chest.
* – Never mind that Naruto is, obviously, a Japanese story on numerous levels, and so the storytelling, as well as the character development, is going to be quite different from expected American storytelling norms. This seemed to be the one major point that the most vocal of this subset would often forget or ignore in their arguments.
** – I’m well aware that this could be mansplaining. Louis and Lepas didn’t explicitly state that’s what it was, so I’m not going down that route here, but it would not surprise me if that was part of it. And yes, I have seen it thrown at both male and female creators. Still, if it was mansplaining, that’s not cool either. It’s not well-meant criticism. You’re just being a douche.
*
WHAT IS MY NEXT WRITING PROJECT? I can year y’all asking me that through the intertubes (mainly because you’re about as sick as I am with me blathering on about the damn trilogy). I’ve got it narrowed down to three projects: another novel in the Mendaihu Universe, the time-travel idea I’ve had for some time, or the music-related novel I outlined a short time ago using my daily words. Each of them has merit, and I’m pretty sure the latter two will have a much quicker turnaround than the first one, so it’s still up in the air.
I’ll be making a decision quite soon, so as soon as I’ve made the decision, I’ll let you know. One of them may actually involve some reader participation of some kind, and I’m really looking forward to trying to get that to work. We shall see!
Apologies for the lack of substantive posts lately. The Day Job hasn’t been insanely busy, but it’s been consistently busy, which means I have not had a moment to pop online and do any posting. Plus I’ve been doing a lot of offline and personal things well, so I don’t always have the time to pop in and post.
And yes, I’m still editing. That’s going to be a while. *sigh*
I’ve been thinking about this for awhile now, and it’s high time I act on it.
I’m going to take a little time off and think about what I want to do with this blog. Of course I’d like to keep it going, but it seems to have lost its direction. Or more to the point, I never gave this blog much of a direction other than posting thoughts about writing and all the behind-the-scenes stuff that goes along with it. One can only be a pantser for so long before one runs out of ideas and starts repeating themselves.
More importantly: I’ve been VERY lax with the business end of the writing biz lately as well, and that is not a good thing.
I have two books out there doing diddly because I haven’t been trying to sell them. They’re just…out there. In a void.
And that needs to change. I need to put them under the spotlight again.
Plus — and this is a BIG plus — I have some publishing-related plans that I’d like to put into action. More on that at a later time, but for now, those plans need serious attention.
So.
I’m not sure how long I’ll be afk, but I won’t be posting again, at least with any susbstance, at least until mid-August. I may do a fly-by or two, but that’s about it.
Thanks for your patience and understanding. I’m hoping I’ll be recharged and a hell of a lot more active when I return.
Welcome to Bridgetown 