Life in progress

Monthly Archives: November 2013


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Write What You Know

Write what you know; write what you know; yes, yes, okay we get it already. But have you ever wanted to write who you know? Fictionally that is.

When I write, I write characters. Plots in my stories, are secondary. I take, for instance, a scenario, ask ‘what if?’ and off I go. Once I have a character in place, they decide what happens in the circumstance I put them in.

I know a few people very well. Family, friends – I can’t help but know them. The people I don’t know very well, I study. I watch the way their expressions change when they talk about certain topics that they love or which scare them… you get the picture, right?

But there’s that saying again. That rule. Write what you know.

Now say, for instance, I was to write about someone I adore. They probably wouldn’t mind. They’d be able to hold my bestseller up high and say, ‘This is about me!’ and they’d be proud to do it. But what if I wrote about someone who I don’t respect? Or someone whose personality is less than scrupulous? I wouldn’t use their real name, of course. And the story would not be the one they lived in real life. But they’d know. And I’d know that they knew. And then I’d have to wonder; are they planning to do something devious to smite me? After all, they aren’t the most the most pleasant person to deal with in the first place. How far will they go?

Write what you know. I know very little about ‘things,’ but I know a lot about people. About characters and what makes people tick.

Have you ever ‘written’ someone you know, fictionally? How would you feel if someone ‘wrote’ you?

Tick tick tick… boom!


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Serendipity

ser·en·dip·i·ty

noun \ˌser-ən-ˈdi-pə-tē\

: luck that takes the form of finding valuable or pleasant things that are not looked for

:  the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for; also :  an instance of this
The above is according to Merriam-Webster online.

The most notable instance of serendipity in my life was the meeting, for the second time, of my children’s father.

Luc and I first met when we worked together in Aurora, a small town just north of Toronto. He came into my workplace and asked for my boss. The first time I laid eyes on him I remember thinking to myself, “And what the fuck do you want?” It had been a hectic day, or so I tell myself twenty-eight years hence. I was, hours later, to find out that he was my new manager, and I thanked the heavens above that I hadn’t said out loud what I was thinking. We’ve laughed about it many times since.

Months passed, and he and I got along well. He’s a nice guy. Then he was transferred. A few weeks later I found out that he’d broken up with his girlfriend. I, too, had broken up with my boyfriend and was looking for a roommate. I offered, he refused. Shortly after he decided to go back to Montreal, to be close to family and we lost touch completely.

Seven years down the road found me living close to Ottawa. I’d been there for a couple of months and was heading back home to see my mom near Aurora and I stopped for gas. Luc was there, working at the pumps. It was serendipity – fate, if you will. A year later we moved into our own house and I was pregnant with our first son.

Three kids plus a few years later another seemingly serendipitous event occurred in my life. As it turned out, it wasn’t so lucky and my relationship with Luc ended. Perhaps it was fate, but if it was, I haven’t seen many benefits from it. I am single, yet again.

This all comes to mind because I met someone online, a couple of days ago, with whom I have a great deal in common. Whether it will continue into a lasting friendship or fizzle into nothing as these things sometimes do, remains to be seen. But for now it feels like fate.

We never know what fate will drop in our laps in the next instant. We can only hope to have great serendipitous events, that brighten our outlook, that give us hope for the future, and that help us to believe that maybe there is such a thing as good luck.

Serendipity can take us to important periods of our lives, which may seem to have been fated to happen. On the other hand it could be some little thing, like losing and then finding a piece of jewelry. Just about everything leads to something, right?

What is your best serendipitous event? I’d love to hear about it. If it’s really wonderful, why don’t you blog about it? Just please be sure to put a link in the comments here, so I don’t miss it.


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If Only, part deux

real

I find myself saying ‘If I could only just…’ a lot.

If I could only just find more time to write…

If I could only just have more money…

If I could only just find true love…

It goes on, ad infinitum. But all these things denote that I’m not content, when for the most part, I am. I have my children here with me, we have a roof over our heads, the air inside is warmer than outside, and there is food in the fridge. And I’m keeping up with my writing quite well, although sometimes it’s a struggle to do anything else.

So what is it which makes me wish for more?  Is it simply the human condition to keep striving? It’s hard, for me at least, to keep my mind from going, from wandering, and from wondering what it would be like if I had just a little more.

ghost

Now if only I could consume nothing but coffee and chocolate and wine and cheese …. then I’d be happy.

What would make you happy?


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Word Press Views and What I’ve Discovered

It’s been a week since I posted Getting Views is Like Pulling Teeth in which I complained that since the reader went all to hell my view count has gone down, so I thought I’d post a follow-up on the conclusions I’ve come to.

As Chris McMullen (http://chrismcmullen.wordpress.com/) pointed out, the new pop-up window in the reader does seem to provide us with what counts as a view. I know this because I’m now getting as many views as I am ‘likes.’ This is something they’ve fixed recently, obviously, because last week when I posted, I wasn’t. I’d be happy to know if anyone else is finding the same result.

But at the same time I’m finding my views per visitor as dropped substantially and I think this is really where the problem lies. While it’s great to have lots of views for the post we just published, the pop-up window still discourages people from visiting our sites, from following, and from seeing what else we have to offer. It’s especially damaging for those of us who are selling something on our websites, particularly if we’ve paid for the site in order to do just that.

I encourage everyone who has a problem with this to complain.  Here is the link to the forum which discusses it: http://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/reader-changed?replies=284

They have already addressed the issue of my initial complaint, (not to me personally) which was to please put the word count back in the reader for each post. If you click on the word count, now that it’s back, you bypass the pop-up window and go straight to the original site. If you click on the title of the post, you get the pop-up window. However, if the post is short and doesn’t have any more words than fit in the reader preview, it’s obviously not an option – you just get the pop-up.

I did change my reader view to “Read full post…” and I believe that has helped my view count at least. You can do this by going here, and I quote: “In your dashboard go to Settings/Reading and then scroll down to “For each article in a feed, show”. Select either Full Text or Summary.” Thanks to mewhoami (http://mewhoami.wordpress.com/) for this tip.

Anyone who is still following this thread and is still interested in this topic, I’d love to know if you’ve made or seen any changes in the past week and have come to the same conclusions, or if you plan to write and mention your dissatisfaction with this awful ‘improvement’, in the forums. I think the more we talk about this issue with Word Press, the more we’re likely to have something done about it.

Thanks very much for being on board with me on this. 🙂


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Women’s Work

I read in the paper the other day about a man in Northern Quebec who is whining about the fact that people don’t want to bring their kids to his daycare. He advertised locally, with simply the name of his business, his address and his phone number. Parents showed up to check the place out, seemed happy, but then declined his services once they found out he would be running it and actually be the one looking after their kids.

Now, while this may, on the surface, seem like gender discrimination, the fact is that people want their young children cared for by women. It’s not a matter of ability, necessarily, but more a matter of instinct. YES, men have most of the instincts required to look after children, but many parents don’t see it that way. Then there are the stories in the news of men (what is it, 1% or less?) who have been known to abuse children in their care, in some way or another. I wish it wasn’t true, but every major city has had these stories.

The article about the daycare brought up in my memory another occupation which I found out doesn’t welcome men. At the dry cleaning business on my paper route there is a wash and fold service. They will not hire a man to do this job. It makes sense – many women wouldn’t bring their clothes, particularly their underwear, in to be washed and handled by a man. Does it make sense? No. Panties are inanimate objects. Even if the guy behind the counter is sniffing them, they don’t care. But women, like parents, are sensitive to some things.

Would you take your kids to be looked after all day by a strange man? I wouldn’t. Ladies, would you take your underwear to be washed by a strange man? …depends how strange he is.

Is it fair that men are discriminated against in these cases? Maybe not. But it makes sense.

What do you think?


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Slapstick

Warning: The following my cause you to spit coffee out of your nose. Please read with caution.

Do you ever have so many things go wrong at once that you wonder if you’re on a sitcom and nobody told you? I had one of those moments at 6:30 this morning – far too early to start wondering who started the cameras rolling.

So there I was, standing at the counter in my kitchen, painstakingly crushing my son’s chewable vitamin with the blunt end of a knife as I do every morning. He won’t chew it – I have to stir it into his yogurt.

Anyway, there I was with this fine fine powder on the counter when my cellphone alarm went off in my pocket. I reached for the phone and pulled the crushed pill off the counter – all over the floor.

So I go to the broom closet, take out the broom and drop the dustpan. Bend down to pick up the dustpan, the mop falls and hits me on the head. Stuff the mop back in the broom closet, go back to the kitchen. Sweep up the mess, almost knock an opened bottle of wine on the floor with the broom handle.

Yes, there was a stopper in the bottle; no, I don’t drink wine at 6:30am, though I’m not sure why not.

All this happened in the space of about ninety seconds. One of those mornings when I just wanted to go back to bed and start again, you know?


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Writerly Procrastinations

In all honesty, I have to say I don’t believe Candy Crush Saga is a procrastination tool. It’s a way for me to escape my story for a few minutes and do something mindless that allows my imagination to wander.

When I’m not hungry but I get up to get myself something to eat anyway, that’s procrastination. Candy Crush Saga keeps me in my chair.

When I check my WordPress stats or my email, that’s procrastination. Candy Crush Saga takes far less time than that, especially if I have comments on my blog.

When I post a new blog to ask other people what they do to procrastinate, that’s procrastination.

So, how do you procrastinate?

Oh look, I have a new life on Candy Crush Saga! Gotta go.

 


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Shhh! Don’t Tell!

I’m an excellent person for keeping secrets. Unfortunately, I’m a horrible liar. Unless it comes to my mother, in which case I’ve been practicing since I was four and had it down to an art by the time I was a teenager, I blush, I look the other way, I avoid eye contact… I do everything in the book that will show anyone with an ounce of observational skills that I’m not telling the truth.

Is it a good idea to entrust a bad liar with a secret? If the person you’re confiding in knows your deepest darkests, and they also know, say, your spouse, do you hope that somehow they will suddenly find the ability to not blush, or simply avoid your loved ones lest they give you away?

I’m finding myself confronted with these issues, not in real life, but because of my writing. My plot is so thick with secrets at the moment, that not only am I having a hard time keeping track of who knows what, but I’m finding it difficult to not give things away to my reader.

I actually studied the body language of people who are lying, just so that I could write a more believable liar. In this, I’ve found the perfect way to tell when my kids aren’t telling the truth, and how I, myself, can become a better liar.

But back to telling secrets. Everyone has them, whether they’re big like infidelity or small like you think someone looks horrible in their favourite suit. Fibbing is a necessity when it comes to secrets. Secrets in fiction can be the backbone of a story.

Can a person who is a bad liar even have secrets? I sometimes feel as though I’m an open book, for all to see. Maybe that’s why secrets are prevalent in my fiction – practice for real life. I’m puzzling it out on paper.

Do you suffer with this dilemma, either in fiction or in real life with yourself or someone you confide in?

Tell me. Tell me your secrets. I won’t tell anyone, promise. 😉


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10,000

I’m finding it difficult to come up with something trivial to post here today, when in the Philippines so many are feared dead.

There have been too many natural disasters to count, far too many innocent lives.

It boggles the mind.


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It’s Official

As of today, two of my children are adults. My middle son turned 18 today.

It’s really strange for me. I know I’ve said it before, but I’m in a unique position. I can watch him shave his face, reach up to hug him because he’s so much taller than I am, and yet I bought him Lego to unwrap today – the contradiction being because he is severely autistic.

I feel sad that he isn’t like his older brother – thinking about moving in with his girlfriend. I don’t know that he’ll ever have one.  But at the same time I am, very very slightly, content that for a while longer I will be able to watch over him.

A very happy birthday to you, Chris.

Chris

I love you very much.