On Inspiration

It’s one of the questions that writers hear most, and one of those that makes most writers shrug their shoulders, shake their heads, or just plain want to tear their hair out.

Where do you get inspiration to write?

It’s as ridiculous a question as asking how one gets inspired to drive to work, but I’m willing to give a little on it. For so long, we (both writers and the general public– I’ll let us all shoulder the blame for this) have mystified the whole process of writing. It’s something that requires a special set of skills, a special mindset, a way of thinking and relating, and, so, of course, one who does not write can’t really help but wonder how one who does gets to that writing.

What inspires you? they ask.

Let me tell you.

1) The shower. You think I’m kidding but I’m not. I remember hearing something once (and, admittedly, it might have been on 30 Rock) that when you’re distracted by something as base and simple as showering, your brain has access to more of your thoughts– or, rather, gets more space to do it’s thinking. You’re busy trying to keep shampoo out of your eyes, and so your brain can tool along its happy path, wondering what would happen if someone were to jump from the top of a three story building into a pool, and then, lo and behold, you’ve figured out the escape route for your character who is cornered on the roof of his apartment building.

2) The car. Similar to the shower, but not quite. I mean, at this point, you’re attempting not to kill other people, but what, pray tell, are you supposed to do while waiting in gridlock or idling at a light? The radio, after all, only plays the same five songs on repeat all day, so it’s not like you’re going to find yourself introduced to something new and startling in the music world. Sure, you could listen to NPR, but you also are a person who spends 90% of their day already fretting about the state of the world, so you don’t really need the help (I may be speaking from experience).

3) Observation. This should be a no-brainer. Who hasn’t come up with entire histories for strangers in a coffee shop, stories for lip-read conversations, what-if scenarios for if the guy had stepped off the curb a second later? It’s like scripting your own TV show without having to pay anyone.

4) Interaction. Sorry to say, the old adage is true: anything you say and do can, and probably will, end up in a writer’s work, in some form. Conversations spark ideas, that come to rest in a story. That lame chat you had about what season mangoes are harvested while you each poured a cup of coffee in the break room? That’s now in a manuscript about a dystopian future when fruit is a novelty. We find novelty in things that may happen, day to day, hour to hour, without thought, because they fit neatly in a space we’ve been trying to fill in a story. A story about your childhood dance class, or the way you adjusted your skirt are now part of the repertoire.

5) Reading. “Good writers borrow, great writers steal outright.” (attributed to either T.S. Eliot, or Aaron Sorkin, depending on what part of the internet you land on) I wouldn’t say that’s totally true, but, certainly, reading influences writing. I’ve always been baffled by so-called writers who don’t care for reading. It’s as suspicious as chefs who don’t look like they eat (I’m looking at you, Giada De Laurentiis). But, moreover, reading is, in a way, similar to sitting around, talking about ideas and art with people you enjoy and respect. You probably shouldn’t write a thinly-veiled imitation of something like, say, 1984, but certainly your dystopian future can (and probably should) be influenced by George Orwell.

6) Writing. You knew it was coming, right? If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know that I’m a drill sergeant for consistency in a writing regimen, and insistent that the only way to get better as a writer is to write. The truth is, though, you also are most likely to find your inspiration in the actual act of writing. Sitting down and writing, no matter what it is, stimulates the brain, and the imagination. Maybe you have no clue what you’re starting with, and maybe it sucks for a hundred, or a thousand, words, but the more you do it, the easier it is, and the more ideas come.

I cringe at the idea that one must have a grand inspiration in order to motivate their writing. The truth is: few of us have all that exciting lives. If we sit around and wait for inspiration to strike, we’re more likely to be hit by a bolt of lightening out of the sky (according to really cursory Googling, I’m finding you have a 1 in 1,200 chance of that which is, suffice to say, pretty unlikely, and a really good simile for my point).

Inspiration is made. The longer you sit around and wait for it, the longer you’ll sit around and write nothing.

And that’s just sad.

On Feminism

or, subtitled: The Radical Notion Why You (Yes, You), Should Shut the F Up.

Caution: I understand that you may come here for discussion of writing, reading, or humorous anecdotes. This is not any of those. This is your last warning of that fact: I value you, and love you as a reader, but, should the topic of feminism, and the complications of men and media therein, disinterest, or anger, you, then you should stop now. I’ll be back later with something more entertaining – I think about fictional murder.

Further: this is my blog, and, as such, is not a debate forum. While I abhor the use of the concept of “safe space,” this is, indeed, mine. If you have a differing opinion, I am not, currently, interested in hearing it. I’m happy to read something on a blog that might be linked, but comments that are not on-topic, or accusatory, defaming, or outright misogynistic, will be deleted without being read.

I’m not a cruel person. I am not the most intelligent person on earth. However, my views are mine, and I believe in them whole-heartedly. I welcome you to read, and engage, but will not tolerate anything approaching sexism, racism, or any other such prejudice in the name of “discourse.”

That said, read on.

Today, on two different topics, I was spoken down to, belittled, and reminded, oh so kindly, by a man. This was not, frankly, a surprise: quite unfortunately, it is somewhat of a daily occurrence. If you are a woman, I assume you are unshocked. If you are a man, you might have a myriad of thoughts about this fact, including, maybe, that I am an airhead.

You’re not far off-base. I am. But I am also not a moron. I might squeal over John Krasinski, and coo over babies, I am also an aware citizen of our world, politically astute, and quite engaged in many issues.

If you have met me, you are aware that I am the following:

1. short
2. glasses-wearing
3. busty
4. rather shy
5. have a lisp
6. tend towards a sort of dramatic hyperbole in my descriptions

I am easily intimidated, given I am a small female. It’s a fact of my life – I’ve never been tall, obviously, and have always identified as female. I developed early, and have never appeared as anything other than a biological female.

If you are a woman, you know where this is going. If you are a man, it’s likely you have no clue.

It’s not your fault. The thing that can be avoided, that can prevent any fault on your part, is found by the following:

Shut up.

I am married to a man, who I love very much. I have a fantastic father, and very good male friends. I, unlike many other, have had men in my life, all my life, who are great and good and kind men. 

It’s complicated, explaining to men what it is like to be a woman. It’s something, truly, we don’t think about on the daily, ourselves. It’s a way of being, of living, that you don’t really parse out until confronted with the need to.

Confronted with rape, with harassment, with denial of services or healthcare, revocation of rights. Confronted with a media that tells you you are too fat or thin, too short or too tall, too masculine or feminine, too flaky or too ambitious, too maternal or too businesslike. 

I’ve stood in my living room, suddenly faced with a news report that, indeed, I am a lesser woman because I do not have a full-time job. Articles on the internet inform me that because I don’t care to wear heels, I am not attractive to men. I wake in the morning and get dressed, take my kids to school, and am informed that I am not engaged as a parent because I didn’t attend last night’s PTA meeting.

As a woman, you rarely win.

It’s difficult to explain because: men don’t face this. There are give and take situations in everyone’s life, but, as it is, being is not something men have to worry about. They might, surely, if they are a man of conscientiousness, of emotion and thought, but, even then: they are not required. Missing a PTA meeting does not make a man a poor father. Not wearing a suit does not make a man unattractive to the opposite sex. 

I am not here to deny the struggles of men. I just need this space to say: YOU DON’T GET IT AND YOU NEED TO STOP TALKING.

There is a culture of minimizing experience, now. I don’t know if it’s new, or if it sprouted up in the wake of social media, of 140 character commentary, of soundbites that sound clever on Facebook. We post up memes of ten words, Impact font, to replace meaningful discussion. Gifs stand in place of emotion.

I am guilty of all of the above. I like a good, clever quip, a gif of Liz Lemon high-fiving herself rather than spelling out my feelings. This is a right of anyone with an internet connection: to be flippant.

Today, I was spoken down to in short soundbites. “Just sayin'” was uttered. “Why don’t you look again” was recommended.

Shut up.

There is no reason to baby me, but, guys: take an extra moment to think. Do you understand that we don’t have equal rights? Do you understand that, as it stands, we’re not sure we actually have a right to the condition and well-being of our own bodies? My bank demands, despite repeated signed paperwork, that I receive my husband’s approval for major transactions. His name comes first on checks, on bills, on loans. We are buying a house, and a lender waved off any information about me, despite my credit being much higher.

Mansplaining is funny, a joke, until you’re the focus of it. Today a man told me to stop and think. This is not new. It is still jarring, still appalling, and I am sitting, over an hour later, seething at my desk.

I have a degree. I have worked in multiple fields. I have actively participated in political groups, attended rallies and speeches, have combed resources and investigated.

I was told to stop and think, without a second thought on the part of a man.

I need you to shut up. I need you to spend another minute, two, thinking about who you are talking to, what a life that is unlike your own might be like. Where your intelligence is excused, where assumptions take place of facts – where your skirt asserts your fault when walking down a street, where your position begets a personality you have never displayed.

You won’t get it. It’s okay. But until you’re willing to make an attempt:

Shut up.

 

 

 

I less than three editing

When I was eleven years old, my mother and I were at the grocery store. We were waiting at the deli for our order, when my mother saw a sign on a nearby display. CHEESE’S, it read.

Faster than you can blink, my mother had dug a pen out of her purse and was crossing out the apostrophe.

My family is really into proper grammar.

When I was in college, my degree program insisted I take a variety of writing courses that I had very little interest in taking: technical and business writing, logic. I was surprisingly good at tech writing, but I found my niche in editing.

Writers, as a group, hate editors. Now, it might be because I do enjoy self-loathing so much (it’s my sport), I am both a writer, and work freelance as an editor. I have never had quite the same visceral reaction to my work being edited as I have heard from other writers. The sight of red pen (or, in this computer age, red tracking marks) does not send me into a panic spiral. I have never been afraid to kill my babies or, really, kill the prettiest phrases that have ever jumped from my fingertips.

The last couple weeks have been taken up with editing the collabs I’ve written with Laila. The one was in its last round before being sent out for submission, and the second is in its first, messy round. I’ve been told writers can’t edit themselves, that they don’t have the distance, or the ability to be openly critical of themselves. Perhaps the majority of writers have healthier self-esteem than I, or a longer memory (have I mentioned I strongly relate to Dory, from Finding Nemo?).

I fell no compunctions when it comes to editing my work. I can slash and burn with the best of them, and have no real attachment to any words or phrases that I have wrought in the past. There is, actually, a certain satisfaction in picking apart, in cutting and honing, that I can’t even get from writing.

There is, indeed, too, a sense of purpose that comes with editing. Combing through words you wrote weeks and months before, pulling the story together tighter, as if with stitches, and seeing how the story turns into something you can feel proud of, and feel good about sending to – agents, editors, publishing houses, your mom, that is weirdly a rush I can’t quite replicate even in the telling.
I don’t know if I have a special skill, or if, as I said above, some kind of deficit: poor memory, masochism. The editing part of writing is just as natural, and needed, to me as the creating part. There is no violence in removal, I don’t think, just the beginning of something new.

Today has been reading, and rereading, and making words that sounded good together before sound fantastic. It’s like its only little reward: a tweak, a nudge, a pinch of salt – and then it’s exactly the way it should be.

You’ve got character (also, GIFs)

It may not be clear here, with my irregular and somewhat paranoid blogging habits, but I am rather outspoken about my beliefs and views. I’m the type of person who has to be restrained when I’m offended, and sometimes has no idea when it’s time to shut up.

 

On the flip side, I’m also a massive introvert, shy to the point of painful, and prefer my little corner than venturing out into the world all that much. Given that writing improves from experience, or at least knowledge, curiosity, I spend a great deal of time researching.

Over the course of my career and non-career (being the times when I wrote a lot of very silly things with no real forward movement), I’ve written about many things, and learned many things. I have learned how to keep chickens, and how one hot-wires a car. I’ve learned how to care for a victim of brain injury and the process by which film is developed and prints made. I’ve also learned a lot about various religions, and that remains one of my favorite subjects.

Writing about something with which you have fundamental disagreements is difficult, but vastly entertaining. I enjoy a challenge, and I also enjoy creating characters I might not necessarily like, were I to meet them, but still would like to convey in a sympathetic manner. Villains  I admit, are not my forte. But objectionable people? Oh yes.

I also understand that my objectionable might not be yours. Therein lies the twist of creating a character who is still believable  even when you (the writer) might very well punch them in the nose should you meet on the street.

Once upon a time, Laila and I were writing something crack-y together (full disclosure: it was forum role-playing. I admit my extreme nerdiness). My character was anti-abortion. She asked me once how I could possibly write him without grinding my teeth into dust, given that I’m your wacky neighborhood socialist liberal pro-choice hippie freak. I’ve donated to Planned Parenthood, I’ve marched for women’s reproductive rights. My character fought, quite loudly, with his girlfriend, in public, over fetal rights.

I believe that everyone is entitled to their opinions (even if I think they’re wrong). I also believe in creating multi-faceted and layered characters. I ALSO believe in exploring ideas and beliefs that are not my own, and, maybe, if I’m successful, forming a sort of understanding of said views.

In truth, I like a challenge, and a stretch – I write mostly about people, and how they interact and react to each other and the world around them. It would be a bore to write characters with only my views, and my life experiences.

I have written anti-choice characters though I am rabidly pro-choice, I have written about Catholics even as I am somewhere in the range of agnostic, I have written about drifters, farmers, army medics, cops, musicians, child prodigies – even a Republic straight-edge teenager named after a president. I have a fascination with people that leads me to learn as much as I can about them, and examine their views in contrast to my own.

Also, this might have been an excuse to use copious GIFs.

***

On a similar, but not at all note, voting is up for the second round of the Smut Marathon! Head on over and see if you can pick me out, and vote for your favorite character description!

let’s talk about muses

Or not. Because that’s just stupid.

Moreover, I’m interested in the actual topic of inspiration versus just sit down and work.

In the interest of full disclosure: I am not good at anything but writing. I have a creative brain but little in the way of skills. My crafting is almost always a one-time thing. I would never call myself a good artist (and I believe my art school instructors would hasten to agree with me). I have no skill with language or math, a terrible memory for history and facts, and a sort of stereotypical dislike for science. In short, I could never be anything but a writer. I just suck at everything else.

I do not think I am special. If anything, I’d say I’m more pathetic than your average bear. My skills are rooted in sitting around and amusing myself with imaginary people, and then typing what I think. It’s not a far cry from a monkey with a typewriter, except for the fact I rarely throw feces.

You did catch the rarely part, right?

I don’t believe in inspiration. Inspiration sounds entirely too divine to describe what I do. I sit,  I think, and my brain does its job. WELL DONE, BRAIN. Here’s a cookie in the form of endorphins brought on by sex and wine.

I fear for those writers who elevate the process to something akin to a religious experience. We are not God, even in our little made-up worlds. Stories, in order to function, require a more articulate hand than that of God. It’s tinkering, not a great flood or… something (let’s be honest here: not only am I not a Biblical scholar, but I don’t really care, either. I was raised by apathetic agnostics, after all. Our spiritual beliefs are summed up with an “eh, I suppose something could be out there. Or not.”)

To believe one is evolved, elevated, in such a way is dangerous dangerous thinking. To claim one needs inspiration to churn out a clump of words is ridiculous. Wouldn’t you think a neurosurgeon refusing to operate because he was “lacking inspiration” horrifying? How self-indulgent.

Okay, fine, a writer isn’t really saving lives (let’s not get too metaphorical here). But the commentary still stands.

A writer is a writer because they write. Sitting around and not writing is, what, a thinker? And he doesn’t even move.

I’ll be here all week, people.

PS. I misspelled “inspiration” every single time I attempted it in this post. My inability to spell can be a topic for another time.