Thanksgiving Mayhem

My stepfather has a gigantic family. Gi-gan-tic. They're descendants of Welsh immigrants that came to South Jersey in... get this... the 17th century. Yep. And they all stayed, more or less, right where they settled, for over 300 years. Brilliant. Only in America... sort of.

So, at the Thanksgiving Reunion yesterday, there were 140 B___'s present. 140! But there was one person present that really stood out: my step-nephew M.

M. was diagnosed with schizophrenia not too long ago, and had some trepidation about coming down to the circus that is the B___ Thanksgiving. He was doing quite well--he's got some awesome medications now--and I got to talk to him for a while.

Why is this important?

Because I'm bipolar. And because my early 20s --the age he is now-- were equally full of family strife, unemployment, and struggle for normalcy. While we didn't get into the trading of war stories, I could tell it was comforting for him to speak with someone who knew, at least in part, what it's like to live with a brain that makes you suffer.

My mother saw us talking and promptly burst into tears. Those years were traumatic for her as well, but now with things so much better (knock on wood), she felt an immense relief knowing that I could speak with M. without getting sucked down into despair.

And for that she was grateful. And I am grateful. And M., though he struggles, is also grateful that he was able to find a little corner of comfort in the chaos that is Thanksgiving at the Fellowship Hall.

Gratitude. And Hope.

Problem: My Feet are Cold

My feet are cold and I can't knit socks fast enough to keep them warm. I may have to cave and go to Wal-Mart -- I loathe Wal-Mart, but it's the only thing going around here -- and get some machine-made socks. Damn. I love knitting my nice wool warmy warmy socks. I guess that's what I'll be doing more of this winter. That and working on the novel, apparently with cold feet.

I could wear shoes, I suppose, but I'm a barefoot girl, always have been. My mom used to buy me slippers every Christmas in the hope that I would take to wearing them. She tried every kind imaginable: Fluffy Dog slippers, boiled wool clog-slippers, grandma slippers, etc. She finally hit on something when she got me slipper-socks, the kind with the little grabby rubber treads on the bottom. Those I would wear. When I moved out here, though, all my slipper socks were so grubby that I chucked them all.

Slipper socks. In my old apartment in San Liberal, it got so cold in the apartment in the wintertime -- like 59 degrees in the mornings and after dark -- that I would have to wear multiple layers of clothing... or else have to turn on the gas heat and pay an arm and a leg with my utilities bill. I was such a cheapskate, figuring I'd rather suffer than pay. It only gets cold in San Liberal for about 3 months out of the year. Still. That's a $20 increase per month to pay for the gas heat, and I was poor as a churchmouse. So no heat for me.

And now, at the very least, my utilities are covered and I'm not living in an apartment whose walls are essentially all windows. (Windows with no view, I might add.) So maybe I won't be so cold after all.

But my feet, my poor feet, how they require a new pair of slipper socks!

Off to Wal-Mart. ::sigh::

Random Bullets: Hard to Post These Days

• I don't know why it's so hard to motivate to post. I mean, blogging is supposed to be fun, right? I guess I'm just in a blogging funk.
• Things around here are not going well. Disillusionment is happening. And it is damn cold.
• I wore my "Phinally" Phillies hoodie today. Man, how much do I love my Mom for getting me that hoodie? And how happy am I that the Phillies won the Series... still?!?!
• I have amazing new shoes that I got at the Target in Delaware the other day. Talk about Fuck-Me Pumps. They just openly kick ass. So what if they only cost me 25 bucks? Who's counting?
• I heard from the exbf lurking near DC. Man, what a hoot. Why did I let him go? Or better yet, why did he let me go? It's hard to know, even now, who did the leaving...
• Cold cold cold.
• The novel bides its time. It mocks me from afar.
• So g-d tired that I can't think of anything except sleep. Na-night, blogosphere. :-)
  

So How's It Going?

A recent commenter asked how things were going with the novel, if I was still writing it. The truth is, I haven't written a word in about 10 days. Why?

Well, there was the trip down South, for one, where I discovered that ex-lovers are ex-lovers for a reason, especially when they vote Republican and support the Cuban trade embargo, and that apparently, I've got a sexy vibe, if one can believe drunken Carolina Panther fans.

There's also the fact that there was rampant idiocy in the forums of the NaNoWriMo website, which I've bitched about thoroughly, so I'll drop it. But FYI, if you don't know the difference between "a" and "an," you probably shouldn't be writing a fucking novel.

::stepping off soapbox::

And then there's my sense of having read too much. I love literature, I have a Master's Degree in it, actually. I love literary theory. I love dissecting and even occasionally disemboweling literature, especially the Modernists. I'm just a Modernist in a PostModern body. And where is there room for Modernists this day and age?

It is my quandary about Modernism that has me stalled, because for all my technical experimentation that I've done in my 6,600 words, I fear that my style does not fit my subject matter. That my actual story line is too pedestrian for verbal wizardry and the kind of mind-fuck Modernist strategies that I'm ripping off from Virginia Woolf and Faulkner and such.

So, there's an incongruency there that bothers the hell out of me, and I don't know how to transcend it, because I'm wedded to my stylistic adventures, but I suck at theme and plot... as did the Modernists, now that I think about it.

I guess, considering that "plot" was never high on the to-do list of any self-respecting, anti-Aristotelian Modernist, I should simply forge ahead with my explorations of character and hope that one day all of them actually talk to each other and do something.

Then I'll have a book.

It just won't be the one that's due on 30 November.

Sorry for the Silence

I haven't posted in a while, sorry. I decided to give up both on NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo at the same time.

Not that I've *really* given up on NaNoWriMo... just the principle of it. I'm here to write a novel, yes, and this got me jump-started, hurrah, but there's something that's just too too too neurotic about NaNoWriMo.

And I don't play well with others. I kept trying to stir things up in the forums and getting nothing back, which led to great frustration and the realization that the maxim "Everyone has a book in them" is really utter bullshit.

Maybe everyone *does* have a book in them. That doesn't mean they should necessarily write it.

But kudos to all WriMos for trying, including myself. Who knows if this book is any good or not. Who really cares.

I'm feeling a bit nihilist tonight. Winter is here and I've got my doldrums on.

There was snow the other day, just enough to make things pretty.

It's very cold in the apartment...

Heading Home

I'm going home. Hurrah.

I got hit on so much down here in the SouthLand. I *never* get hit on at home. I didn't know what to do with it. I told one guy, "Ehh. You just have your beer goggles on. If you didn't you wouldn't be hitting on me." Which prompted an unusual response: a lecture from the drunk letch on how I shouldn't be so down on myself and I should have more self-respect.

That was surprising. It was like a drunk, male Oprah telling me to love myself, honey.

Don't feel like it. Especially when my pep talk was coming from a guy who talked to my breasts rather than my face.

::sigh::

Still, it was nice to be found attractive, even just a little bit.

Now, home, to rampant isolation and the call of NaNoWriMo.

Whereupon I Bitch Some More about NaNoWriMo

Dear God, I have read far too much literary theory.

This is my thinking, all you WriMos out there: BREAK THE RULES.

Of course, to break the rules, you have to know the rules... and therein lies my problem with NaNoWriMo: too many people writing that don't know/respect/dare to challenge the rules.

I know this all sounds really elitist, and that I should be celebrating the fact that so many people are connecting with their inner novelist, but c'mon let's get real about what the future hold for these novels.

1. There will be a wonderful sense of accomplishment that the WriMo will receive upon finishing... hell, even upon starting.
2. There will be a tremendous burst of creativity that will be very satisfying to the writer.
3. There will be a tremendous crash when this project comes suddenly (and arbitrarily) to an end.
4. For some, there will be a drawer somewhere in the house with a manuscript somewhere in the stages of completion that will languish indefinitely.
5. For others, there will be grandiosity that leads to attempts to find an agent, who then crushes the hopes of the WriMo by telling them to go back to the drawing board.
6. For a very select few, there will be revision and rewriting, a similar hunt for an agent, and the shopping around for a publisher who will either accept or reject the book which is now entirely different from what emerged during the course of November.

People, this is not your shot at immortality! This is your shot at self-actualization. Any immortality that results is not because of NaNoWriMo. It is because of what happens after NaNoWriMo.

However, to give NaNoWriMo its due... none of the immortality would come about without the ballsy aspiration to write a novel in a month.

::sigh::

OK, NaNoWriMo, you win. I'll take my frustration and place it squarely where it belongs: with my own failure to produce and my constant procrastination reading the forum topics and mocking them.

I'm a horrible person.

Swank

I am currently on the top floor of a swank hotel in The City that Banking Built in the SouthLand. Here for a little networking.

Swank hotels amuse me; each one has its own little quirks. In this one, for example, in order to use the elevator, you have to insert your room key first. Never seen that before. And they have the coffee maker on the desk instead of in the bathroom, you know, where the water is.

I came in here and there was some tranquil imagery and music on the TV, very funny, but no King-Sized bed as I asked for. Two doubles. Which is really really useless when you're just one little person.

It's gray and overcast here, raining even.

Has anyone ever noticed how when they're getting their picture taken, Southern girls always cock their head slightly to one side and smile in way that you *know* they practiced it in a mirror, or for months before their cotillion? Just a little something I noticed in the society pages of "Uptown" magazine.

Big Ol' Jet Airlinah

Leaving tomorrow... well, today, actually, for a trip to the SouthLand to see a friend or two. Could be interesting. One is a former, shall we say, fling. The other I met in Germany in one of my many travels hither and yon.

The Fling, well, he's all married w/ kids now, and I have the feeling I make him distinctly uncomfortable, mostly due to some of the choices I've made in my life... some of which have landed me back here.

But I'll be on a plane in a few hours (in First Class, I might add) because I used my many, many Frequent Flier Miles to upgrade. Woo. And Hoo. Can't wait to see if they actually still serve *food* in First Class. God knows they don't in Coach.

I'll try to keep up with posting while I'm there, but I may just end up failing NaBloPoMo for November because of this trip.

Wish me luck! I really don't want to fail!

Watch. Listen. Learn.

OK, This Pisses Me Off

So, my uncle got laid off from his job down in Virginia. Sad, but who isn't getting laid off these days? My aunt is... get this... blaming the "new administration" for their own personal economic downturn.

Wha wha whaaaaat?

The new administration isn't even in office yet!

Feh.

Republicans.

Online Life

I'm exhausted. Everything in my life is exhausting right now. It's just too much. NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo are eating my soul.

I keep thinking about how now everyone's building a life online in some way or other, even just with email. I have a friend who said that he now finds it unusual when people *don't* have a blog or some sort of website. MySpace, LiveJournal, Facebook... We are building a Second Life. Which isn't even mentioning Second Life.

We are becoming a society devoid of privacy, exhibitionists all of us. But you know, I think that's a pessimistic way to look at it. I really believe that our gravitation towards having an online presence is a way of breaking out of the isolation of our daily lives. I think it is symptomatic of a world that has gotten very lonely in recent years. We're reaching out to each other, complete strangers.

If you think about it, it's really quite beautiful.

.... Now if only we could stop judging each other...

Modernism & the Word War

I've got a ton of books on Modernism. Considering that the Postmodern Genre has been totally played out, I've decided to return to the source of all things individualistic and rebellious, my one great love, Modernism.

I'm not sure I understand all the social and political forces that went into the creation of such works of beauty as "To the Lighthouse" (which I'm presently reading) or "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon", but no matter... it's the result that's important, more than anything else.

I find Virginia Woolf's style to be absolutely inspired, and I'm using "Mrs. Dalloway" and "To the Lighthouse" as tutors in this endeavor.

The problem is... I've gotten so caught up in my research on Modernist style(s) that my word count has only minimally increased over the past 36 hours.

One of the problems is that the book is kind of stalled, action-wise. I'm having too much fun exploring the inner motivations of my character and so I'm just having her walk around the house, making coffee, rearranging furniture, etc, all while thinking about her life. It's fun! But I'm afraid it will be just plain boring to the reader.

But we'll see.

Anyway, that's the update for today. Now back to the Word War.

Word War! and Week One Recap

The goal is: 10,000 words this weekend. 10,000!!!!

So I'm hunkering down to work on getting to 15K total words by 11:59 p.m. Sunday night.

I'm still getting settled in, and am using NaBloPoMo as a warm-up in a way... Good on NaBloPoMo.

Week One was both elation: (Obama!!!) and disappointment (Prop 8). Writing-wise it was both elation: (I'm finally doing this!!!!) and disappointment (I've been so caught up in the election that I've only got 5,000 words!!! D'oh!!!)

I'm very excited because I'm starting to feel like I'm defining my style a bit, and realizing that I don't need to be consistent in this draft, that I just need to try new stuff. (Or at least, new to me. Probably not so new to Virgina Woolf. Not that I'm comparing myself to her. But I *am* imitating her.)

This is just great. But from what I understand, Week 2 is known as "The Sophomore Slump" and considering how much trouble I had with Week 1, I am very nervous about Week 2.

It seems, though, if I can meet the Word War challenge, I might be well on my way...

Will keep you posted.

Getting Frustrated with NaNoWriMo

... not the novel itself, that's not frustrating, that's fun...

No, I'm getting frustrated with the lack of feedback that I'm getting in the forums. I keep posting stuff that's meant to be a little challenging, like this:

It seems to me that the confusion over what is termed "LitFic" in part stems from the question as to whether the novels that have become canonical -- Crime and Punishment, Wuthering Heights, The Grapes of Wrath, etc. -- actually still qualify as LitFic. I tend to agree with a previous commenter that LitFic is more of a recent market designation and that these examples of "classic" literature don't really fit in with the designation. LitFic could perhaps also be designated as Contemporary Literature, that is, literary output that is, in its own way, vying for inclusion in the canon, which is ever-expanding. That may be an elitist view of LitFic as a genre, but so be it.

I also agree that it is an outgrowth of Modernism, and that in itself points to a certain elitism as well.

Let me be clear: I'm not saying that LitFic targets a specific audience, or that it attracts a specific audience. But its stylistic focus and emphasis on characterization, often at the expense of plot, present challenges that Genre Fiction (often, but not always) does not.

LitFic writers are, I think, by nature a little more experimental with technique and tend to draw attention to the medium of language itself, thus the connection with Modernism.

I'm sure I've said something here that's going to make someone angry. Fire away.

You know what I've gotten so far? NUTTIN HONEY. Not a single response to that. I even pulled out the big guns, calling Lit Fic elitist! For the love of PETE, what does a person have to do to start some dialogue??? Am I talking over people's heads here? I don't think I'm offering any sort of insight that is incomprehensible. Just a little quid pro quo, my fellow writers, is that so fucking hard?!?!

Sorry for the language.

Anyway, I'm going to go back to work on the novel. Bless it.

Prop 8 :-(

So, Prop 8 passed in CA. That's very distressing for my friends who live there... and it's very distressing for me, knowing that they're distressed.

I don't understand how it passed. I mean, it's California, for the love of Pete!

More later.

First the Phillies, Now This????

Wow, I don't know how much happiness I can contain!!!

Buena suerte, President-Elect Obama. You've brought me the hope I've been lacking for eight years now. Whether or not we know it yet, we are all behind you.

Woo-hoo!!! Obama!!!

That's All You've Got?

I posted something to one of the forums about my question about Dialogue Markers on the NaNoWriMo website, and the responses I got back were... wait for it... dreary and disappointing.

One said that they were at least a little necessary, but that I could connect the dialogue to the action and therefore avoid all the "s/he saids".

Another suggested I read some Hemingway... Not a bad idea, that one.

The next said the following: "The "said" tag is an invisible marker useful to let the reader keep track of what is going on. It is not a cardinal sin. It is, in fact, a Good Thing. Readers will thank you for it." MORE ON THAT LATER.

The following suggested the simple solution of writing script, and the last said roughly the equivalent, which would be great if I actually were writing a script or screenplay. Otherwise, useless.

The issue that I have with this advice is that it's really not advice. It's about preference. And what's more, it's about the tyranny of the Reader and the Market.

I posted this reply:

Thanks for the suggestions. I guess one can't do away with markers entirely after all, unless...

A couple people have mentioned The Reader as a sort of judge-and-jury. But what if you're writing something that's meant to be highly experimental? Does readability come into play at that point? Because if I'm writing this book more or less for myself, cam I, for lack of a better word, "go for it" with my experiment with no dialogue markers (or even use of quotation marks!) or must I be ever-tuned to the Reader's desires? Catering to the reader seems to me to not be the best option all the time, IMO.

In other words, I'm looking to challenge the reader rather than entertain the reader. Not a popular way to go, but it brings up a good question: when so much of published fiction these days caters to the reader, what happens to the avant-garde? Is it rendered mute for being unpublishable?

I'm just wondering where the proverbial edge of the envelope is these days, in terms of adventures in style.

And I am wondering what room there is for something new and different, or, if in the words of the Barenaked Ladies, "It's all been done before".

The optimist in me that lurks paradoxically in the dark corners of my mind says that there's always something new to find.

So off I go in pursuit of the new. I guess, after all, I am a Neo-Modernist (not a Post-Modernist)--now THERE'S a term the academy needs desperately: Neo-Modernist.

More on that tomorrow.

Day Two Recap: Dialogue Markers

Well, Day Two was not as smooth as Day One, but I got in my 1667 words. I'm not so sure if I like forcing myself to write in these average chunks. I'm kind of wishing that I had kept writing the first day well past the 1667 marker, because I was on a roll.

So now I'm thinking that I need to write in terms of scenes, just complete my scenes one at a time, if they're big, break them up a little, but anything to keep the thread going.

I'm also puzzling right now over dialogue markers. The thing is, I hate dialogue markers, especially the "creative" ones: she exhaled, he shouted, they snorted, etc. Too forced.

So I'm trying to write without dialogue markers, not even quotation marks. It's ridiculously hard, and may, in fact, be slowing me down significantly right now. But at the same time, it is a great challenge to try and figure out how to do this, and I love a good stylistic challenge.

It's time for me to do my evening writing, so I'd best get to it... See you later for the Day Three Recap!

Day One Recap

I wrote the first 1,675 words of my novel yesterday... It was a very interesting experience, because the writing itself went a lot more smoothly than I thought it would. I'm not complaining! I know that it won't be as smooth all the time, certainly not, but wow! How exhilarating!

I feel like I've been waiting for 15 years to write this novel, and the fact that I'm finally doing it, well, I need to give myself a deserved pat on the back for even starting.

Anecdote:

Long, long ago I worked at Big Chain Bookstore, and there I met all sorts of fascinating people that were in various stages of drop-out-of-college goodness, or taking the fast track through the multi-level hell of depression, all of us just trying to figure out who the hell we were. We called it the "Home of the Unmedicated Minority" because we were all popping our anti-depressants like candy, all day, every day... and flush shelving in between doses.

One night, I went to Ruby Tuesday's with one of my co-workers, a girl a few years older than I who would eventually end up in the Foreign Service, but who gave the appearance of being a dumb bunny. We went to this totally mediocre restaurant to talk, and all I remember of the conversation is telling her about how much I wanted to be a writer, but how bogged down I was by my own circumstance.

She said to me, and I'll never forget it: "When you let it all go, that's when you get your gift."

Have I gotten my gift? This NaNoWriMo thing certainly feels like a gift, even if it's not the gift that Tina was talking about.

As for letting go, well... more on that later.

First Day of NaNoWriMo...

OK, so it's the first day of NaNoWriMo, and I was intending to go to bed early, get up at midnight, and immediately start writing. But alas, I came down with the flu yesterday and so there was nothing but sleep in the works for me. I woke up at 4:30 a.m. with the thought of *maybe* starting then, but at that point, everything above my shoulders felt like it was on a spring. I was a bobble-head doll.

SPROING!

So I went back to bed. Now I'm about to dig in and start writing. I have to remember that this doesn't have to be the Great American Novel (here on out referred to as the GAN), it just has to be finished. Or at least meeting the word count. So I think today I will do the following:

1. Rest a-plenty. This does involve orange juice, copious amounts of herbal tea with lemon and honey, and at least three episodes of "The O.C." (Don't judge me!!! It's healing with brain candy.)
2. Look over my character sketches and outlines one more time, make sure I've got basic (extremely basic) plot points worked out.
3. Re-read the first few chapters of No Plot? No Problem! by NaNoWriMo God Chris Baty.
   
4. Consider what I want my first scene to be.
5. Start writing.
6. COFFEE!
7. Stay awake long enough to take advantage of that extra hour as we move from EDT into EST at 2 a.m.

Woo-hoo!

And awaaaaaay we go!