Tag: Personal

My First Great Novel

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Did you hear the light, wistful strains of violins wafting about the other day? I’m sure I did, as I was looking through things in my closet and picked up a tied-up bundle of fabric. The violin theme swelled as I untied it and laid out seven square quilt blocks. I had found remnants of my very first novel.

I’d written stories since I was nine years old, but this one was different. I began it when I was sixteen, and it was the one that introduced me to intoxication of novel-writing. Characters, setting, names, dialogue, conflict, romance, resolution… I drank deeply if inexpertly.

I based the novel on several selections of the opera Carmen by Georges Bizet. I imagined a princess, Ria*, who had to flee from a burning castle, was taken in by a farmgirl and had to learn to live as a peasant, was discovered and arrested and almost executed, only to be rescued and whisked off to a hideout deep in a forest. She eventually learns that the family friend who betrayed her was in fact working to protect her — but despite his being handsome and courageous and blue-eyed, MY princess fell in love with a clever, witty, and not-really-handsome green-eyed prince. Totally subverted expectations there!

(I also subverted the expectation that the novel would have a plot. Plots are hard.)

In case anyone wondered if a sixteen-year-old created this world, it was set in a land where each of the seven provinces was named for a jewel. Because why wouldn’t they use jewel names? Can you imagine how much more interesting addresses would be if our states were named for jewels? “My address is 121 Day Street, Millertown, Peridot, USA.”

Anyway, I can’t express just how completely I was immersed in my own world. I worked on this story almost continuously for three years. I spotted people who looked like my characters. I collected rhinestone jewelry that reminded me of the provinces. I listened to music that let me pretend I was hanging out with Ria and Co. And I dragged my obliging mother and long-suffering younger sister along for the whole dang journey.

Mom taught me how to actually write, while my sister, R, sat through innumerable reading sessions and discussions of my characters. Even my young nieces caught the bug; they used to spend hours pretending to be my characters in their hidden camp. The Ria Story (because I was bad at titles) was an fixed feature of our lives during those years.

So in retrospect, it made perfect sense that R and I spent who-knows-how-long designing and sewing seven quilt blocks to illustrate a folksong that Mom and I made up to go with the story.

Here you go: the Seven Provinces (with two extra blocks for symmetry’s sake): Amber, Sapphire, Vanyth, Amethyst, Ruby, Jaize, and Emerald.

(Oh, you noticed those gemstones you’ve never heard of? Well, Jaize — Ria’s own province — was originally Jade. But “jade” has too many negative connotations in English, so I made up my own gem. And then to justify it, I changed Opal to Vanyth.)

When I re-discovered these blocks, I spent most of the day trying to remember the song that went with them. It came back in pieces — to the point that I’d be browning meat for tacos and suddenly exclaim, “A merry feast on a golden plate and Emerald’s wine in a toast!” I still haven’t remembered the first verse, or the words that go with the ring-and-book block (to my chagrin, because that ring-and-book block was Ria’s own province and therefore The Most Important One). I sent the pictures to my sister R, who remembered each piece of the song after I quoted it to her. Mom had forgotten all of it.

I revised The Ria Story heavily in about 2007, streamlining it and giving it a plot, to the point that these quilt blocks hardly make any sense now. But my sister says that she wouldn’t mind having a copy anyway, just to show her own girls what we spent so much time talking about as teenagers.

So I’m trying to polish up the fairly terrible beginning into a sort-of readable state. I doubt this new generation will fall in love with the story like I did. I’m not sure anyone can. It’s not a viable story, but it will always be my first great novel.

*My princess’s name wasn’t just Ria. It was longer than that. The ability to make up completely new names was kind of a power rush. I got a little carried away. Best to just leave it at that.**

**Okay, okay. Her whole name was Vallarenzaria. Happy now?

8 Late Updates

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The updates aren’t particularly late, I guess. But it rhymes!

Interesting how nothing bloggable has happened since November, huh? Well, the truth is, too much has happened — many things that made me think, “I should post about that.” You know what they say about good intentions and how they’re ideal for diabolical road maintenance. I’m just giving up and writing out a list of updates.

1. I’m writing a novel. Yes, the same one I’ve mentioned over the past (sigh) two years. Two or three times, I thought the end was in sight. I got really excited. And then I’d run into a snag that required me to go several chapters back and rewrite. Which is where I am now, having to write in an entirely new event to justify the climax.

2. It’s going to be a good novel! My problem is that I tend to write stories that are similar to existing genres, but don’t quite fit in one. They’re too lighthearted for drama and too serious for beach reads. So in my current novel, I’ve got a young librarian in a small town who has two love interests; but at the same time she’s dealing with the ongoing effects of racism and abuse. So definitely not an easy fit into one particular category.

3. I’m putting this item third, but I really ought to put it first, last, and in between all other points. In January, my kids’ best friend, a 13-year-old boy who was like a nephew to me, died suddenly of a previously unsuspected brain clot. He and his family have lived directly across from us for sixteen years, and he spent hours at our house. His loss is inexpressible. My kids are still pretty numb, and my husband is able to compartmentalize a broken heart. But I go through every day with my brain repeating, over and over, that our favorite friend is gone. It’s very difficult to watch his family grieve, and to try not looking too far ahead at all the years that he won’t be here. It’s hard, and sad, and I wish we could rewind and get another chance.

4. But life goes on, weirdly enough. I can switch from flooding tears to figuring out the day’s schedule in a moment.

5. Some stuff has been happening in the Toxic Christian Patriarchy world. A lot of it happened around the time we lost our friend, and I just couldn’t dredge up enough spirit to care. Fortunately, others have covered it better than I could anyway.

Go here to read about how Bill Gothard of IBLP/ATI had to face his accusers in court. The suit was dismissed due to the statute of limitations, but the judge allowed each woman to speak and validated them afterward.

Here’s the Joy frequently covers the various implosions among long-entrenched church leaders.

You know how Christians are always looking at “our country” and shaking their heads and praying for revival? If you ask me, those prayers are being answered. Powerful men are finding that they can’t squash their victims’ voices like  generations of men before them could.

6. We’re finishing up another year of homeschooling, but this year is different — this year we’re graduating our oldest daughter. I wrote an open letter to her to commemorate the occasion. It’s odd to be writing to an almost-adult, when I still clearly remember her as a newborn baby with her nose smashed sideways from the birth.

7. I’m seriously excited about this novel I’m writing. (It’s still untitled since I can’t title my works until I’m done.) I’m finding space to allow my characters to be that confusing mix of good and bad that everyone is. It’s especially important in this novel, I think, because it’s set in a little Southern town with the usual history of racism. It would be all too easy to write it as “bad guys racist, good guys not.” But I strive to write real, human characters — and none of us possess all of the approved virtues that would make us a full-fledged “good guy.”  If only I could keep the plot from tangling up, I’d get this thing done!

8. (The fact that there’s a plot at all is a dramatic improvement from my earlier attempts at novels.)

Summer is coming. Writing is on the docket. That looks pretty good to me.

Fifty Shades of Fiction

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pexels-photo

Am I coming out as a secret fan of Fifty Shades of Grey?

Well, the books began as a fan-fiction retelling of Twilight. I will say that I don’t like Fifty Shades as much as I liked Twilight. 

And I utterly despise Twilight.

No, I’m not a fan. I did try to read the first book. The writing was abysmal, the characters were intolerable, and having been fed toxic patriarchy in my younger years, the forced-submission stuff made me want to cry. A good sex story shouldn’t make you cry.

So why have I linked to the video below? Well, sorry, it’s actually not as salacious as secret sex dungeons and thinly-veiled abuse. I’m linking to one section of it where he talks about fiction vs. reality, because I think this is an area where people haven’t really thought through things.

I’ve heard many times, “How can a woman support the #metoo movement against sexual harassment when she reads things like Fifty Shades of Grey?” Or any erotic fantasy, really, because the genre so often blurs the line between consent and compulsion. This argument frustrates me. What people enjoy in fiction is often exactly the opposite of what they want in reality. In fiction you want conflict, drama, danger, and uncertainty. In real life, you want trust, reliability, peace, and security. Granted, I look askance at the fact that Fifty Shades was ever so popular because, really, it’s a very terrible series on many levels. But I don’t think that enjoying erotic fiction means a woman has no say in whether her boss can pat her butt or require sexual attention for her to keep her job.

The video explains it better, though. Why do we look for situations and stories in fiction that we don’t want in real life?

If you’ve got time, I recommend watching the whole thing, because he goes on to take apart 50 Shades (book and movie) and explain why it doesn’t work even in the context of fiction.

(Note: I have friends who like Twilight and Fifty Shades. Especially for Twilight, it really seemed to hit people on some deep level while they were dealing with difficult issues in their lives. I have no idea why, mostly because they can’t tell me either. They like it, I don’t, we’ve agreed to disagree.)

Sabbath Restlessness

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I occasionally see a meme that thinks it’s solved my church problem for me. It informs me that if I stopped going to church because someone hurt me, then it’s obvious I was focused on people instead of Jesus. In short, if I find church a hard place to be, it’s my own fault.

Do I need to say that I hate that meme? No? Good.

It’s difficult for me to attend church. Even when I don’t fall prey to a panic attack, I find the whole process exhausting. When my choice is to go to a coffee shop and be refreshed, or go to church and be tired… well, the choice kind of makes itself, doesn’t it?

But I try. After all, we’re part of a healthy and safe church now. Nobody reminds me that I have to stay under authority. Nobody is twisting up Scriptures. Nobody watches my kids and judges my parenting. I know it’s a good place.

But it’s hard to feel that.

Recently I attended a service. I even took along colored pens and a journal with faux-reclaimed paper that my daughter got me for my birthday. I listen best when I can doodle, something I no longer apologize for.

Halfway through the sermon, I’d filled up two pages like this:

Untitled design

When I start journalling like that, it means I’m desperately trying to outrun panic. And I didn’t make it this time. I left long before church was done.

When I looked at the pages later, I was struck at how it captures the frenzy of my thoughts in church. Not only am I reliving and grieving past hurts, but I’m also evaluating every word of the sermon to make sure it’s “okay.” My radar, so long suppressed, is on high alert at all times.

No wonder I get tired.

My husband is very understanding, but a lot of people aren’t. A lot of people look at spiritual abuse survivors and criticize them for not getting involved in a church. Well, here you go — handy-dandy photographic evidence of what a service looks like to someone who has been hurt by people in the church. 

I don’t skip church on Sundays because I’m spiritually apathetic. I avoid it because I’m on spiritual hyperdrive. And I long for the day that a church sanctuary is as safe and restful a place for me as a shabby-chic hipster coffee shop.

A Tip for When You Meet an Author

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If you read a book you like, and then invite the author for coffee, here’s a tip: Bring a couple of copies to be signed, and then make sure that your nails coordinate with the cover of the book.

Alternatively, if you’re an author, choose a book cover that complements your readers’ unconventional style.

20171109_124910

I live for the times I hear from readers. Meeting them is a hundred times better.

Check out her blog here to read the thoughts and experiences of someone who grew up in a real-life Fellowship culture.

Thanks for a fun coffee date, Lady Adelaide. I really do love your nails.

Pre-Made Book Covers

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One of the more surprising secrets of the indie-publishing trade is that there are entire sites selling pre-made book covers.

[I highly recommend Go On Write for pre-made, but not generic, book covers. I’m inserting this link here so you don’t have to wade through the rest of the post to find it. But please do finish the post before sailing away.]

You, the author, write your book and go buy a cover that fits it. You can spend quite a lot on them, but most of them cost within the $30 – $50 range.

And I obviously lucked out, huh? Both of my book covers are excellent. Yeah, well, that took a little more “doing” than just buying a $50 digital file

Browsing through a few hundred covers will tell you that the more “genre” your story is, the easier it is to find a cover for it. (If you happen to write paranormal romance, you are set for life and beyond.)

If, however, you write stories that don’t fit easily into any one category, even a dozen pre-made cover sites can fail you. They definitely failed me.

I ended up using a custom service for The Fellowship, but had to spell out highly specific instructions. I even went to the paint store, picked out two or three suitable colors, and emailed the numbers to the designer. I’m happy with the outcome, but I felt slightly gypped that I did nearly all the creative work, while paying $200-some for it.

I couldn’t afford to do the same with Go Right. So I pored over pre-made cover sites. The one site I kept returning to was Go On Write (which I think of as “goon write” because that’s how its address appears). These covers, while still mostly catering to genre fiction, showed a lot of creativity and sparkle.* The mock titles are entertaining as well.

I still didn’t find what I needed. Since I had a very clear idea of what I wanted, I took the chance on his custom service. The turnaround was fast, and I was very pleased with the result. It was more expensive than just buying one off the site, but all I had to do was toss him the ideas and a stock photo. A year later, I came back asking for the digital cover to be converted into a “wraparound” cover for a physical book. (That’s one of his other services, so an extra charge for it.) The result is beautiful.

I’ve also bought three other covers from him. (Once a cover is sold, he doesn’t reuse it.) I’m pretty sure I’ll write stories to go with them one day.

Anyway, that’s my endorsement — I used this service, I was happy with it, so I’m passing it on to someone else who might find it useful. And it’s plain fun to just browse his site. Go check it out!

*He obviously does a lot of business for erotica, both straight and gay, so be advised his wares are not all G-rated.

Dear ____, Love Sara.

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Dear Blog,

I’m so sorry. Between homeschooling, writing a new novel, and — you know — living, I haven’t had much time for blogging.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear Other Novelists,

I don’t understand how you can say, “I’m working on a new novel, and here’s my first chapter!” Everything I write is in a state of flux until its final edit. I mean, I just changed the main character’s name and her bike’s name. Just not ready to share anything yet.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear AOL Instant Messenger,

I read recently that you have officially passed away. My friends and I don’t use you anymore, but we mourned your passing. You were the social savior for all of us cult kids in the 90s. I’m not even sure I would have gotten married without AIM access to keep in touch with DJ.

I will wave a sad farewell as that little door-closing sound makes it final slam.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear Other Novelists,

It’s going to be an excellent story when I’m done. A friendly white girl learns how racial injustice in the not-too-distant past still affects our lives today. So far I have two love interests, a narcissistic grandmother, and at least three Jane Austen references. Ha, I see you baring your teeth in jealousy. That’s right. It’s going to be good.

The bike’s new name is Imogene, by the way.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear Enya,

I found out that you released an album as recently as 2015. You were my guilty indulgence in the 90s, along with AIM. I was supposed to be listening to “godly” music, defined by our Revered Leader as any music that emphasized beats 1 and 3 in the rhythm line. (I didn’t make that up.) But you usually didn’t have a driving rhythm line, so I could justify listening to you — despite fears that you were spewing New Age spiritism all over my fragile Christian soul. Thank you for giving me some relief from choral hymns and harp music.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear Misguided Readers,

What do you mean, does my  main character run a cute little shop and interact with colorful characters? Do you really expect me to write cute little bumbling romantic scenes? Do you even need a final piece of folksy feminine wisdom to wrap everything up? Oh horrors, I’m not the women’s fiction you’re looking for.

Love, Sara.

*

Dear Grammar Nerd,

Okay, yes, I know. The second sentence of this post should begin with “among,” not “between,” because I listed more than two reasons. Thank you for your contribution. Nerd.

Love, Sara.

White Oblivion

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stocksnap_q621it4pyjThis past Monday night, we listened to an excerpt of Martin Luther King Jr.’s profound and poetic “I Have a Dream” speech, read in a raspy Batman-like rumble. (DJ has a cold.)

Most of it went right over the kids’ heads (although Bookgirl probably caught a lot of it this time around). I’m glad that DJ makes a point to read it every year anyway. He and I need to hear it and understand where we’ve come from.

As I’ve said before, I grew up in South Mississippi. We were a lower middle-class white family, somewhere between belle and redneck. The “desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression” that King references in his speech wasn’t the Mississippi I knew. I was vaguely aware that things had been bad “back then,” but it wasn’t anything I recognized in my world. The white community didn’t teach its next generation hate and anger.

It taught us oblivion.

We — my white friends and I — didn’t understand how recently segregation had been the order of the day. It simply wasn’t discussed. Martin Luther King, Jr. was dismissed with a slight shrug of distaste. I didn’t know anything about Rosa Parks until my sixth grade English teacher, a black woman, dedicated a day of class to her. Thanks to Norman Rockwell’s painting, I knew about Ruby Bridges and integration, but not the seething hate that surrounded her. I was married before I learned about the Detroit race riots (thank you, Dreamgirls). It was last year while researching for a story that I looked up “race relations 1972” and discovered that things were still really nasty in Boston and Washington, D.C.

Of course, as a child, I didn’t understand a lot of things. And as I got older, none of these facts were concealed from me. The white community simply didn’t bring them up.

Later in the evening of MLK Day, I got myself some ice cream and sat down with what I consider leisure reading — a 1963 issue of Better Homes and Gardens. At first the significance of the publication year didn’t occur to me. But I began reading an article about how families could make the most of their money, and King’s words came back to me.

I read, “It’s sad but true that a great many homes in America today are below the standard of what their owners should have and can afford.” And a thought crept in, You don’t mean the “the negro’s basic mobility from a smaller ghetto to a larger one,” do you?

I read, “A packaged weekend ski trip that includes bus transportation, four meals and two night’s lodging, rental of ski equipment and tow charges, costs only $37 per person…” Assuming you aren’t denied those meals and lodging.

I read, “Traveling by car offers the advantage of convenience and savings on transportation costs for a large family… Motels and hotels charge about $9.50 a night for two…” Two WHITE PEOPLE. The words were a roar in my head.

This magazine, a “family magazine” for “Americans today,” was written only for white people. And I’d never really thought much about it, because I’m part of the club, so it’s easy to assume that everybody gets the same benefit.

Outright black oppression at the hands of white supremacy isn’t really history. It’s still living memory. It’s a charred field barely covered over with new growth. More and more I realize that we can’t expect our nation to “move on” from a catastrophe that’s still hot to the touch.

I want healing. I want to see things change. And I’m trying to start with myself. I never singled out other races for hate and disgust. I’ve worked hard to shed some toxic ingrained attitudes of white supremacy.

But I can honestly say that what I’m mostly guilty of is something that’s harder to see in the first place. I’m guilty of oblivion.

So this year especially, I’m grateful for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. I’m glad that we still have his words that make us stop and acknowledge the truth we’d been taught to ignore. May oblivion not blind us to the plight of our neighbors and fellow humans.

How to Get a Story Unstuck

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Let me start with a confession, just to get everything clear and out in the open: I don’t actually have a real method for unsticking a story. But wait! Don’t go away! I do have ideas and suggestions. Which, if you’re interested in this post, is probably more than you have at the moment. Right? Right.

1. Research first

Writing a story isn’t something I can just sit down and get done. Other authors might be different. (Brandon Sanderson apparently can write 1500 words before he wakes up in the morning.) For me, it takes a lot of background research, writing out ideas, looking up character names, collecting possible occupations, and just letting the whole thing simmer in my head for a while. This is an exciting time of development and discovery!

I hate it.

Well, what I really hate is the delay. I want to write, but instead here I am watching quilting tutorials. However, if you get interested in what makes up your characters’ lives and personalities, eventually that will result in a much stronger story.

2. Talk to People

Yes, I’m cheating, because this is technically part of the research stage. But it’s important enough to be its own point. If you need to know about an occupation, a hobby, how to cook certain foods, what it’s like to live somewhere you’ve never been — nothing beats real-life voices and opinions.

For my current Work in Progress (WIP, as we writers refer to it), I’ve messaged six or seven friends for their expertise in certain areas. I’ve watched YouTube videos. I pay attention to conversations, online and in real life, that relate to my subject matter. I plan to attend some community events and get to know real people involved in the world I’m trying to build.

Note:
The research stage takes a lot of time, so you can skip it in two ways:

A. Write about something you already know very well; your research is already done.

B. Fake it and fudge it and write around the stuff you don’t really know. You definitely can write a story this way. Just don’t expect me to like it.

3. Make a List of Possibilities

This trick has gotten me out of Unstuckness many times. But I’d completely forgotten about it until I couldn’t figure out how to start my WIP. I ran a Google search and came up with this article. It’s all good advice, but #9 reintroduced me to my old friend, List of Possibilities.

The concept is simple. You number your page 1 – 10 and then you write down ideas to solve whatever your problem is. You keep thinking and writing until you finish your list. You’ll be surprised at the ideas available once you’re forced to articulate them.

For my problem of how to begin my story, I sat down for my regular writing time* earlier this week, and wrote ten possible openings.

*See my next point about this. Which you would anyway, I guess, but I just wanted to make sure.

I kept making up ideas until I filled up the whole list. It looked like this:

****

Ten Possible Openings
(some written without regard to usefulness or craft, just to fill up the slots.)

1.My grandmother didn’t want to give me the topaz necklace.

2.I was fourteen, it was Christmas Eve, and I was riding around an unfamiliar town with brand-new friends, trying to find somewhere that sold fireworks.

3.When I was fourteen, my paternal grandmother gave me one of her own necklaces. It was smoky topaz, a color that she said suited my ginger hair and freckles. The necklace was special to her, but even more so once it was mine. She often asked me to wear it. That’s how she remembered the story, anyway.

4.Being a librarian, cataloguing comes naturally to me. So as I got ready for work one chilly day in early December, I kept track of the texts and messages that came in on my phone from my dad, stepmom, sister, and brother. Three started with “my god” or “OMG!” One inquired if I were insane. Five overused exclamation points. All seven messages told me to call my grandmother, apologize, and not ruin Christmas for everybody.

5.My life was bookended by grandmothers. Everything else—my parents, stepparents, half-siblings, Christmas in Maryland, Easter in Virginia, growing up in between—was enveloped by the influence of my grandmothers.

Grandmom on my maternal side, my rock and foundation when my life got shaky.

Poppi on my paternal side, the brick wall that never moved, and heaven help the family member who tried to get around her.

6.I wouldn’t say that I grew up with a Good Grandma and a Bad Grandma. I wouldn’t say it out loud, anyway.

7.I liked to curl up in the hanging hammock chair in my living room, snuggled into one of Grandmom’s quilts, and let the swaying lull me into peace. The quilt still smelled like the perfume that Grandmom wore.

8.I guess I like the Dewey decimal system because it puts everything in order and makes sense. It would be nice if my life had a decimal system. I could definitely use a spot for Feelings about The Divorce even though it happened when I was six and I’m twenty-seven now. Or, Of course I love my mother more than my stepmother but Mom could take some lessons from April on being emotionally present most of the time.

I’d need to have a section dedicated to relating to my much-younger half-siblings. And most of all, I’d love to shelve my paternal grandmother. I’m not sure that came out quite right. Then again, considering that it’s Poppi we’re talking about—maybe it did.

9.When I first met Carolina, she was only sixteen and I was only fourteen. But she had enough poise to greet me with a handshake. “Hi, Bria. Nice to meet you.”

I remember the sight of our hands clasped briefly. Her dark skin, lighter along the knuckles, set off my own fair and freckled skin. Even our fingers were a contrast—her smooth oval nails polished in shocking pink, my stubby nails a deliberately offbeat olive-green.

10.When my maternal grandmother died, I packed up all my stuff, left the sprawling suburbia where I grew up, and moved into her old house on 123 Day Street in Delmar, Virgina. If nothing else, it put me three hundred miles away from my paternal grandmother, who was still alive—in case anybody needed proof that life is very unfair.

***

I ran all the ideas through my personal rating system and eventually decided on one. Which one? Well, I hope that when I finish it and give it to the world to read, you’ll see.

4.Write consistently

I kind of have to say this one. When you become an author, you sign the super-secret pact of loyalty that says, among other things, “Anytime somebody asks me about writing, I will without fail tell them to find a time to write consistently.”

Haha, I’m just kidding. Or am I? You won’t know until you join the society of authorship, and the only way you’ll do that is to… guess what?… write consistently.

When I do finally get a draft done, it’s usually because I’ve written it in 300- to 500-word bursts every  morning. Note that, unlike Brandon Sanderson who can write 2500 words while dead, I don’t write a whole lot most of the time. But I’ve carved out a specific time to write, and can keep up any momentum I’ve created. Or even if I don’t have any  momentum, I’m still there to write.

Related to this point…

5.Write anything

Even if you’re not actively writing a story, novel, memoir, whatever — use this time to write. Letters, writing prompts, ideas you’ll one day use, blog posts… Ooh. Blog posts. Yes.

If you’re a writer, start a blog. And then maintain that blog. Who knows if anybody will read it? But it gives you an outlet to write regularly. During the years when I had four young children, homeschooled, and no emotional space to construct real stories, I blogged. It kept my hand in the craft so that when life became less intense, I was already primed and ready to write seriously. (As a major side benefit, we have a fairly regular record of our life stretching back to 2004.)

6.Don’t assume that where you are now is where you’ll always be

One benefit of having finished two serious projects is that now I know the truth. I know I’ll get stuck, the story will tangle up, I’ll hit dead ends… but eventually I’ll figure a way out and finish the story.

That’s not to say that I’ve finished everything I’ve started. I’ve got drafts of two separate stories that I’ve put away for now because I don’t yet know how to tell them properly. But I know that one day, if they’re important to me, I’ll break through the wall and get them in shape. I have before. I will again.

If you’re a writer, you don’t throw in the pencil, turn off the computer, and abandon your foolish passion. You just don’t. You take breaks, find new approaches, and never ever stop writing.

(That’s the in the super-secret author pact too.)

And when I do find a way through a tangle, or when I reach the end of a story, I’m on such a high that I will assure the whole world that it’s worth all that effort just to get to this point.

You know what? It really is.

 

What To Do About That Rapey Song

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This is a post about Christmas songs. And Shel Silverstein. And sex. And good wholesome naughtiness. All, I hope, without the side effect of sermonizing too much. Guess we’ll just have to see how this goes.

Baby, It’s Cold Outside was written in 1944 by Frank Loesser, who performed it with his wife at parties, according to Wikipedia. In 1949, it was featured in the movie Neptune’s Daughter starring Esther Williams and Red Skelton. You know this song, of course. It’s a duet, a clever weaving of two monologues: a woman who says she has to leave, and a man who is seducing her to stay.

Lately it’s gained a bit of notoriety. Not because it’s about sex, because that’s actually a recurring theme in winter songs. Let It Snow celebrates the fact that the weather outside is frightful, so good thing we’re inside and together and hey, how about it? Walking in a Winter Wonderland is a little tamer, but even then they’re looking forward to a little necking in front of the fire. Evidently the human response to cold weather is to have sex (which makes sense; at least it’s warm).

But Baby It’s Cold Outside, while pretty much the same theme as Let It Snow, is quite a bit edgier. It’s known as “the date-rape song” thanks to lines such as:

The neighbors might think (baby, it’s bad out there)
Say what’s in this drink? (no cabs to be had out there)

…

I simply must go (but baby, it’s cold outside)
The answer is no (but baby, it’s cold outside)

…

I’ve disliked the song for years for that exact reason. It makes me anxious, not cozy.

I’m not alone in this feeling. Seems like we could just let it die a quick death, but it’s hard to kill Christmas songs. Last Christmas by Wham!, anyone? Instead, several people are scrambling around doing damage control.

This article from the Washington Post is an example of one perspective. It maintains that at the time the song was written, it was all about women’s empowerment because a woman staying overnight with her lover could expect to come under fire from society. And that is a point. The woman in the song is obviously reluctant to leave, and keeps pointing out all the people who are going to be scandalized if she doesn’t go.

The problem with this patch-up is twofold:

  1. He never offers to protect her from any of the vicious fallout she’ll receive for staying the night with him.
  2. Lady, please. If you don’t want to go, grow a vagina (as the egalitarian saying goes) and say Yes. Stop saying No if you don’t mean it. That confuses good men. (Men unlike your lover who—if you ask me—will ditch you as soon as the family pressure comes bearing down for him to make you an honest woman.)

Others, finding that explanation insufficient, have decided that the song is a total loss as-is. They’ve rewritten it to illustrate proper sexual consent. One version features lyrics like this:

I really can’t stay (Baby I’m fine with that)
I’ve got to go away (Baby I’m cool with that)

…

My mother will start to worry (Call her so she knows you’re fine)

…

I ought to say no no no (You reserve the right to say no)

 

Okay, so I admire the effort… but it’s like drinking flat root beer. Instead of a predatory lover, now you’ve got somebody who:

  1. Doesn’t want her to stay at all but is too nice to say it outright
  2. Is missing all of her flirty hints by earnestly supporting her rights

Either way, the song gets increasingly awkward as it goes. At least in the original song, you’ve got some sizzle and fun.

That’s the problem with sanctifying things. They’re unobjectionable and a good example, but boring. Like characters in kids’ shows, who always make the right choices. Sometimes you’ve just got to be a little naughty for interest.

Shel Silverstein, for example, was a master at writing funny, somewhat macabre, poetry. Kids like them because, well, they’re so wrong.

For instance, Abigail who loved the beautiful pony, but her parents wouldn’t buy it for her. She said she’d die if they didn’t, and they said that nobody ever died from not getting a pony, but guess what? She did die. And her parents were very sorry. The author’s note at the end said, “Show this to your parents if they won’t buy you something you want.”

Or Clarence, who bought new parents. And if your parents nag you or get tired or yell at you, it’s because they’re wearing out and you need to buy new ones too.

Obviously these poems teach a terrible moral. But the kids know it’s wrong and enjoy it.

One reason why the original Baby It’s Cold Outside is (was?) fun is because of the tension of “I must go” and “I want to stay.” It’s naughty.

But that brings us back to why it’s a toxic song for our culture. Even today, sexual consent is widely misunderstood. Several times after Trump’s infamous description of sexual assault, I saw people (men and women both) defend it by saying that women bought Fifty Shades of Grey (the extremely horribly written trilogy about a dominant/submissive sexual relationship), so how can they complain about what Trump said? It’s like people don’t get the difference between consenting sex and sexual assault.

It’s not sex that’s the problem. It’s sex that’s forced on someone who doesn’t want it.

Baby It’s Cold Outside is about someone who wants capitulation, not consent. I don’t trust the man and his dismissive answers to her concerns, his smooth compliments, and his pleas for her not to disappoint him. I’m not convinced he’s going to let her leave if she insists.

Since this song is played over and over every single year to a society that can’t keep sex separated from sexual assault—well, I think it’s a problem. Explaining it away just justifies to all its listeners that its okay for a man to “wear a girl down” (another lyric in the song). Merely rewriting it to “clean it up” kills the thrill.

I see two options:

  1. Rewrite it creatively, so that there’s still tension but not that of a predatory male and a wavering female. Good luck with that.
  2. Just stop playing the dang song already.

And the second option is, really, the best option. Glad we had this discussion.

Now, since it’s cold outside, I think I’ll turn the lights down low and see if my man and I can warm things up. I’m pretty sure he’ll consent.