Life in progress

Category Archives: Blogs


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Private Thoughts, Private World – Part 7

We all have reasons why we write what we write. As I talked about in my blog post ‘To Pseud or not to Pseud’ there are just some things we need to get out of our systems, not all of which we believe our families and friends will appreciate reading or hearing about. But keeping our thoughts to ourselves isn’t just for fiction.

I was reading this post by my good friend at HarsH ReaLiTy and he brought up some excellent points about the dangers of writing non-fiction as well. To simply have an opinion can be not only unfavorable amongst those we know and love but also a very real danger to our well beings. Besides the things Jay (not his real name) mentions in his article such as the repercussions that can result in marital strife and the legal aspects of slander (whether intentional or not) there are also dangers that go from things as simple yet traumatic as internet fights and harassment towards both yourself and your family to the very real possibility of stalking and, Gods forbid, physical harm. Do we therefore stop writing? Hell no!

Hiding behind a pseudonym though can only solve half the problem. Since medieval times and possibly before (I’m no history buff) people have been writing and hiding their names to protect themselves. Our digital footprint, whilst being put into being to protect our children from pedophiles etc., makes it that much harder to conceal ourselves. So unless we go back to printing up leaflets upon which to get out our message we must choose carefully what we decide to share. While I don’t really want to get into the entire ‘freedom of speech’ debate, we still have to consider what our responsibilities, our boundaries and our level of comfort all are before we write publicly.

I read an interview with Sakurai Atsushi (get used to seeing that name on my blog) in which he said, “…I can’t really help who I am and what I create.”  That touched me profoundly. The absolute need for a dedicated writer to produce and to expel his or her thoughts is irrepressible. I believe THAT, not whether or not we have or ever will be published is what makes us writers. How much of that should be restrained or hidden from sight or just concealed from being affiliated with our real identities is something we have to be able to judge for ourselves. May our judgement be sound.


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What is it with today?

All day, all this weird shit has been going on.

First my debit card was compromised – I lost almost $200 and would have lost more had I had more money in the account. When I called the bank the first thing they asked me was, ‘Were you in Puerto Plata yesterday?’ to which I replied ‘HA! I wish’. Anyway, they apparently tried 4 times to withdraw $200 from my account.

Second I get to the dentist’s office to pay my son’s bill for three teeth to be filled – $618. When I asked my ex to pitch in he simply told me he’s broke.  *sigh* …and I’m not. HA! again.

Third, I get home to find I’m apparently NOT a mother and so Mother’s Day didn’t apply to me – see the last comment on my About page.

Fourth, I was sitting in my living room and at exactly the same time my laptop shut itself off and my cellphone came on…except the cellphone doesn’t have a sim card in it. I just keep it around to set alarms on.

Fifth, I’ve tried 3 times to put a link code to my About page in this post and it keeps screwing up.

Is there a sun spot I’m unaware of?

I just…

Is it just me?


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To pseud or not to pseud

…that is the question. What’s in a name after all? It’s something by which you are instantly recognized. But which one of you do you want recognized… I think that’s really what it comes down to.

We all have different personas for different occasions. To my children’s teachers I am nothing but a dedicated mother. To my readers, a sage. (Stop laughing.  Oh okay laugh. It was a joke.)  But seriously, I am myself. I am a woman who has never, on a regular basis, worn makeup. What you see with me is what you get. And yet few of the people in my real life understand where my imagination goes.

This post was brought about by the fact that, after a rather questionable fic I wrote last night, I lost a follower on my fiction blog. Whether it was someone who went ‘Ewww, what am I reading?!’ and clicked unfollow or whether it was someone who deleted their blog (a robot perhaps?) I have no idea. But it got me to thinking. My writing covers many different things. I’ve written a children’s book which is currently being illustrated by a friend and most certainly will go out to a publisher under a pseudonym. The stories I tend to enjoy writing however, go from humorous (my Second Seat on the Right series ) to perverted ( Beauty ) to horror (see a short story entitled ‘Reaper’) and of course the psychologically horrific Boy Series on this blog.

I understand that it’s probably important to write under different names for different genres. My biggest concern, however, is protecting those I love from the depths of my imagination, not only for what they would think (I believe they already suspect a great deal anyway – case in point, my eighteen year old son telling me I’m a sick fuck) but also for what the people my kids have to deal with on a daily basis – what are they whispering about mom?

Having been married a number of times I’ve been through a few aliases in my life, to the point where the hardest part of filling out an application form for something was deciding on my surname. My kids don’t even have the same last name as I do, and to this day you wouldn’t find me under Linda Hill in the phone book. But it was the name I was born with and the name I’ve chosen to stick with from now on, no matter what.

Unless I don’t.DSC00191


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Don’t you hate it when that happens?

I’d decided that I would stop refreshing my damned stats page, I’d stopped looking for new posts to read in my reader and I’d even gone as far as turning off the laptop.  And the other laptop. And the PC.  So I’m standing in the kitchen, making my coffee for the morning and it hits me. The perfect subject for a post. Before I know it I’ve lost count of how many scoops I’ve put in the coffeemaker (I only have to count to seven, but there you go) and I’m trying to decide whether to a) get out a pen and paper and jot down the idea or b) turn a computer back on and risk staying up yet another hour to write – and refresh – and read.

So I’m writing this now (it’s 6:46pm) but all this happened to me last night. I failed to do neither a) nor b) and now I can’t remember what my brilliant idea was. But I still got a post out of the experience, so it wasn’t a total waste. 😛


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Proof

It is done – my final assignment for the last of the courses I am taking this semester. A few extra grey hairs later and more than a few late nights of agonizing over words and sentences and paragraphs and I can finally breathe again. And blog. Speaking of blogging…

As of this moment (that is before I publish this post) I have had a grand total of three visitors to my blog in the eighteen hours that have passed since midnight. This shows me that in order to have anyone visit my blog I have to visit others and comment on them – two things I have had little time to do these past days.

Proof positive that if you want an active blog you need to be active in the blogging community.

…or you need to put hashtags in front of trending words in your title…


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Bored?

For anyone disentranced with content (or lack thereof) of my blog lately (I’m busy finishing up a couple of courses and haven’t had the gray matter for much else) I’d like to remind you that I have a fiction blog here on which I have expended a few spare brain cells to write some amusing and/or dramatic short scenes.
Many of them are unrelated, so they need not be read in order. For your convenience however, I have put the names of the characters in the tags so you can find scenes containing them, should find one or two characters you connect with. My personal favourite is Drommen, a polite pervert who can’t seem to catch a break.

Enjoy. 🙂


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Third Person About

Nothing against the writers and artists who do this but, what is it with people who write their ‘About’ page in the third person? I’m assuming they are the one actually contributing to their own blog so why do they either a) not write their own ‘About’ page, or b) write it as though someone else is narrating their personal story? If it is a writer’s blog surely they are able to write about themselves.

Maybe there’s a stage one gets to when they don’t feel the need to connect personally with those who read their work. Perhaps they are afraid if they do let anyone feel that connection that they will have more of a responsibility to respond to everyone who writes to them. Or, and I suppose this is true, it’s easier just to copy and paste a bio…

I don’t know, is it just me who is a little put off by this? Is there anyone out there that has a third person ‘About’ who can explain to me why they did it?


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Blogging is better than food

Of this, I am now certain. Please bear with me.

In an email to my mate earlier today I wrote the following:

So I’m procrastinating right now. I should be delivering papers but instead I’m reading. What, you ask? Blogs. Anything that’s short enough that I don’t feel as though I’m actually getting into something. Because that would be serious procrastinating rather than the ‘I can stop doing this at any given moment because it’s short’ procrastinating. Hey, that sounds like a blog entry, doesn’t it? I may just copy and paste later.

And now that I have another million and one other things to do, what am I doing instead? You get the idea.

While I was walking around the block delivering my papers (yes, I did finally do them) I thought more about blogging and the effect it has had on me since I started a little over a month ago. It’s addictive! It keeps me up at night and better yet, gives me something to think about when I’m delivering papers! Hey, it’s sapping my energy! And for energy, I need… food! But do I? Not as much as you might think. I’m just a teensy bit overweight.

So then why is blogging better than food? (I had to get around to it sooner or later.)  Before I discovered this wonderful way to avoid the things I should be doing, I would graze. Procrastination meant weight gain.

Therefore I triumph in the logical conclusion that blogging is indeed better than food.

At the very least, that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.