The Fingerprints of Poverty

Over on winniewoohoo.com, I blogged about growing up poor: http://winniewoohoo.com/?p=226

Words from a terrific woman

Need some bucking up or just some spirited advice?
Here are 9 Rules For Success, from the novelist Amelia Barr. (Now here was a lady who probably said "Bow ties are cool"--and meant it!)

Cover: blown!

So, yesterday the Internet blew up because of an article about what it "really" means to be a professional writer (that article isn't loading right now, or I'd link to it, but here's a pretty great response by Brian Keene.) Neil Gaiman voiced a response on Twitter. Chuck Wendig made a response on Twitter. People were talking about this article A LOT.

And I wish they hadn't.

Why? Because they are blowing my cover!

If you look at that blog post by Brian Keene, he says where anybody can read (and I mean anybody, not just those yahoos at the NSA!) that he cleans his house EVERY SUNDAY. That's right. He claims that as a professional writer, he has time to clean his house. There goes my argument that I'm "too busy writing to clean."

Jeez.

Haven't you had those days where you just couldn't motivate yourself to do dishes? Or one of the cats looked so cute sleeping on the couch you couldn't bear to break out the evil vacuum cleaner, even though you just petted a dust bunny so big you mistook for the other cat? Or maybe you knew the BBC was about to make a big announcement about a certain blue box-driving character, so you couldn't tear yourself away from someone live-blogging the big event? Seriously! How could I mop the house when I had to find out who would play the 12th Doctor?

And now I'm going to have to come clean about this lazy streak in me. I can't just wave a hand and say, nonchalantly, "I had a deadline;" OR  "I'm a professional writer, so right now I don't have time to be anal about the house;" OR "The muse held me hostage at my desk. Dinner's going to be corn flakes."

I'm going to have to break down and admit that I'm sometimes just a slob. Or else do what I did today: plotted a short story while I did dishes. If I remember right, that's how a certain writer used to do it.

And if Dame Agatha Christie wasn't a professional writer, who is?

The Road Goes Ever On

I am reading a phenomenal book called Meditations on Middle Earth, edited by Karen Haber (and given to me by my fabulous friendly postman, the single smartest person I've ever known). It's really inspired a lot of thoughts from me, and I hope to discuss it intelligently next week.

Next week.

Because today I am still overwhelmed by the state of the world and the country where I live. This morning four people died in Pennsylvania while the NRA announced a program to train armed guards for the nation's schools. Last week the mall by my house was closed by a madman bent on terror, and twenty-six people were gunned down in their own classrooms.

It's hard to think rationally at these times. It's hard to read an essay on fantasy fiction and write about why it matters. It's hard not to just wish you were a hobbit, living in a snug little hole in the ground.

Brain clearing

I've been thinking a lot on this topic, and this morning the delightful Elizabeth Spann Craig posted on it: The Importance of Doing Nothing. I was so glad to hear her nothing-positive blog, because I am a firm believer in unscheduled time for everyone (and especially kids!). I think time with nothing to do is what inspires creativity and builds a person's character. When you're sitting around mulling over nothing in particular, you sort out a lot of your values and dreams and best ideas!

When I was a kid, we lived too far from anything for lessons or camps or sports. I spent most of my time reading or wandering aimlessly. Sometimes I played in the creek, but mostly I rode my bike in circles and daydreamed. Most of those daydreams turned into stories, about a third of which I started writing down in my early attempts at novels. I never made it more than a thirty pages into a project, but that might have been due to handwriting that even at age ten was pretty abysmal (and that was when my handwriting was at its zenith!). When you work without an outline and your notes are on random scraps of school work, it really helps if you can read them.

In that tradition, my daughter has very few scheduled activities. She's taken a few classes from Parks and Rec, but she's not terribly interested in team sports or music. She wants to be a writer more than anything in the world. Needless to say, yesterday she spent about an hour rolling around on an exercise ball in our living room, doing nothing. I hope its teaching her something important.

Working through the blues

Now I know it's not easy or cool to admit, but sometimes even cowgirls get the blues. And sometimes even writers get them. Maybe it's something minor, like that down feeling you get when you've had a cold for a long time. Maybe you've had some lousy times at work. Or maybe you just struggle when winter hits. We all have those down times*, and that low energy feeling can make it really hard to put in the time for our writing. What can you do about it?

First, let yourself off the hook a little. If you sprained your ankle, you wouldn't expect to win a sprinting competition, would you? Well, when your brain is out of balance or feeling low energy, it's the mental equivalent of a strained muscle or sprained joint. It needs rest. Take care of your mind! Get some extra rest and try to relax.

You also want to take a little extra care of your physical health. A lot of the time we feel down because we're not feeling well and haven't really noticed any symptoms of sickness. If your body's running out of juice, it can't provide a lot of energy for creative endeavors. Try to get some exercise into your day, even if you feel tired and cranky. And avoid sugar, booze and excess caffeine. I've tried drinking extra coffee to get my engine revving when I feel down, and it rarely helps for long. In a pinch, I've found that extra Vitamin C (from juices or EmergenC or just ascorbic acid added to honey and hot water) can give me a bit of extra energy, but that can wreak havoc on your gut. (Just saying.)

After lecturing you about health and rest, it seems the next step is counter-intuitive: work. When my husband was diagnosed with tennis elbow, his doctor gave him an armband to help the muscles rest. But the doctor also gave him some exercises that would strengthen the muscles so they could do a better job supporting the joint. When you're down, you need extra sleep and relaxation. You don't need to sit on your butt watching tv. Give yourself time to work on your writing projects, but give yourself permission to produce less. You want to keep flexing your writing muscles without overtaxing yourself.

The best thing about giving yourself that permission to write less is that you'll probably surprise yourself with how much you can produce! This week, I've been feeling a bit gloomy (I always feel gloomy after I take a trip to visit my parents--I just wish I could live closer to them!) and I haven't written very much. But I have written a little every day, and yesterday, I wrote a lot more than I expected. It felt great! And today I don't feel nearly so gloomy, because I have my writing to cheer me up.

One last thing: if you can find an extra scrap of energy, take a moment to do something nice for someone. Write a positive review of a book you liked. Send a friend a note. Catch up with your Christmas shopping. While you do it, imagine how the recipient will feel when they get that nice experience (and if you think a review can't touch an author's heart, read this one at Doubleshot Reviews and check out the nice note from the author!). Making human connections can be a great reminder that you're not alone and that you've got lots of great gifts to offer the world. And isn't that what life is really about?

Good luck writing through your down time. I can't wait to find out what you produce!

*Note: my advice is for short term downturns in mood. If your dark feelings last longer than two weeks, you may have a more serious condition and might consider getting help. All I've got is hugs and puppy pictures, which I am more than happy to share.

Give Thanks!

It's Thanksgiving week! Hooray! Soon I will be eating pie and drinking coffee, which are two of my favorite things. I also plan to make a nice long list of things I'm grateful for this year, which will definitely be topped by getting a house, getting kitties, and working with James Sutter (myclever and delightful editor over at Pathfinder Tales) on the novel that I'm writing. I feel like I've learned so much about stories this year!

What are you most grateful about this year? Have you learned anything that's helped fill your writing toolbox?

October is for reading

I'm sitting in my office wearing a fleece jacket and wondering if I need a third cup of hot tea. Yep, it's fall! And the best thing about fall is layering up and reading outside in the last sunshine of the year (if you live in Oregon, that is. Those of you in Minnesota are already enjoying your first blizzard!).

I decided that this October, I'd be exploring my influences and sharing them with you--fiction, nonfiction, films and places.

I just finished re-reading a book that I believe is still working its way through my psyche. A remarkable study of family life, The Minotaur, by Barbara Vine (a pen name for Ruth Rendell), is a Gothic novel transported to the 1960s. Like all Gothic novels, the action spins on sex, betrayal, and madness, but the dusty Britishness of the characters reins it all in.

What makes this book work so well for me is the engagement between the characters and the setting. The family lives in an unloved and underfunded mansion, entirely covered with ivy. Far enough from town to require a long hike or a drive, the characters are removed from reality and forced to stew in their own company. In fact, as the book progresses and winter closes its grip on a house with very limited heating, a very gripping sense of claustrophobia settles over the story.

I deeply enjoy novels where the majority of characters are intensely unlikable. Indeed, there are only two really sympathetic characters in the entire book--the others are so pathetic that I found myself feeling sorry for them even as I wanted to kick them in their butts. The ending is really enjoyable.

In case you don't remember, I grew up in a house buried in the woods, a dark and gloomy sort of place. I loved almost everything about it and still pine for it. (Our house was destroyed in a house fire when I was a young teen.) The majority of our community and the communities around it were supported by the timber industry. Needless to say, much of the show Twin Peaks deeply resonates for me--the countryside even looks a lot like home.

I'll be quoting and referencing Twin Peaks all month, leading up to re-watching my favorite episodes in November. To kick it off, here are the opening credits. On the soundtrack, this sounds perfect, but every episode I've ever seen on a television sounds under pitch, just like this copy of the intro does. For some reason, it makes it feel more real!

Nostalgia requires assistance

When I was eight years old, my family decided it was time for me to begin learning to cook. I'm really surprised they waited that long, but the general consensus in the Wagner household was that I was dangerous klutz, more liable to blow up the kitchen than function safely within it. This conviction was supported by my absolute terror of the stove.

But one magical day, one of my sisters convinced me to make some very easy cookies. The cookies requires a top and bottom layer of graham crackers and a gooey caramel filling made from butter, brown sugar, possibly nuts, and maybe graham cracker crumbs. They sounded a bit like these, but with slightly different execution. They were easy and fun to make--and they were the best cookies in the history of man, because I made them.

I still dream about those cookies, but I don't have the recipe for them. I could probably call my mother for the recipe, but since my folks still have dial-up Internet that hogs their phone line, it might be years before I get it. If you have a recipe for them, please direct me to it--or if you have any other super-easy cookie recipes (no-bake, perhaps?), please share. My daughter is learning how to cook. ;)

Never do anything again, ever

Well, this week has been pretty much a bust for accomplishments. But I have a good reason. Well, two. I brought them home on Saturday:

Oh my stars, but they're cute. The whole family adores them. The Kid keeps putting them in baskets and carting them around, singing to them. (And being patient, kind kittens, they let her.) My husband dotes upon them, even forgetting to make coffee because he was playing with the kittens. And of course, I'm the most star-struck of all. I can barely utter a sentence that doesn't contain the word "kitty." We're absolutely ridiculous!

Yep, so unless you count playing with kittens as an accomplishment, I really haven't done anything since they came home. And I'm okay with that!

Hello from my new office!

Hellooo!!

I'm typing a bit exhaustedly--this whole moving business has worn me out. But I am typing from my new desk in my new office in my new house, so I can't complain too much. We are almost done with this crazy process, and I couldn't be more delighted about that. Mess and disaster are not my friends.

If you were sitting with me right now, you'd be looking at this picture. My good friend Galen gave it to me (it's a copy of an illustration from Rigor Amortis) and my husband framed it for me. Some people like to keep photographs of their family on their desk. I'm one of them. ;)

There's not much to update--almost every day has been crammed full of packing and schlepping and scrubbing. Honestly, you're lucky you missed it. But I am happy to say that my story about hinkypunks and swamp magic (a story I was inspired to write by my dear Inkpunks!) has been reprinted in Beneath Ceaseless Skies' new e-anthology, Ceaseless Steam. I can't wait to read this one. You know how much I love anything with a historical flavoring!

Browsing!

Today I went to my new home library, which is a convenient one mile from our  new house. It's adorable--there's a cute park with a duck pond attached to the library--but best of all, the entire basement is a children's library. The books there are separated out into genres and ages in a way that I think it is really accessible. My daughter hasn't really learned how to browse for books yet, and I think this library gives that perfect quiet coziness that you need to really dig through the shelves.

How's the adult section? I don't know. I got sucked into the mid-grade fantasy section and didn't come up until my daughter was ready to check out! I love all genres of books, but mid-grade fantasy is what made me fall in love with reading, and I still love it best of all. I'm finally going to start reading Garth Nix's Keys to Kingdom series--I've never seen book one on the shelf before, and I've been forgetting to put it on hold.

Three cheers for the new library!

Ghost Collies

I don't believe in ghosts. I mean, not in any rational way--I can't think of any logical, substantiated reason to believe in them. But I still get weirded out sometimes, and our house has been acting a little spooky lately. First, the toaster began growling and screaming. Then the radio, which doesn't even have working speakers, turned on at full volume and could not be turned off except by unplugging it. And today a light blew out, but when I returned from the coffee shop, it was turned on and fully operational.

None of this would really be that weird except it began the day we met our realtor.

That's right--we've never had any strange electrical phenomena happen during the six years of our tenancy at this duplex, not until we decided to bid the place adieu. The strangeness of the experience compounds all the feelings I have about moving to make me feel more melancholic and nostalgic about the move. It's easy to look at these strange occurrences and say "Hey! Even the house doesn't want us to move!"

Luckily, I spent yesterday painting at our new house. Despite being all alone, I kept feeling something bump into my leg, the way a dog or a cat will bump its head against your leg to get your attention and say hi. I can't help but think of the two beautiful collies that once lived in the house. Are their spirits letting me know that I'm welcome in their house?

I know there are no real ghost dogs in my new house, although there is certainly plenty of dog hair and a phantom dog aroma rising up out of the thirty-year-old carpet. I also know that light bulbs have troubles in their lives and old appliances are sometimes just weird. I am hoping that there are no serious electrical problems that are going to burn down the duplex any time too soon, since I still have all my stuff in it!

Yep, I know all of this stuff. But the part of me that still gets scared at movies or cry during the sad parts of books--the part of me that makes and loves stories--that part of me wants to go play with the ghost dogs.

Up Close & Personal

This year, blogging's been a struggle. It's hard to know what I should focus on, and that's only been compounded by a drive to present myself more professionally--and the fact that I blog about writing over on the Inkpunks blog. What the heck does a writer-mom-veggie-goofball blog about????

 So my big decision is that I'm going to blog all my professional stuff over at Winniewoohoo.com. I'll blog about writing at the Inkpunks. And I'll blog all the goofball stuff here! Brace yourself for more recipes and silly hijinks.

This week I've been working hard to eat really great, healthy food and conquer some of my crazy cravings. This isn't easy! My family has roots in Missouri, and so I grew up eating good ol' country food: lots of pie, tasty casseroles, and my mom's amazing biscuits. If you're trying to cut calories, biscuits aren't always the best choice, but here are some biscuits you can enjoy calorie-free!

Birthday!

I just have to say that my birthday was GREAT! I had many wonderful birthday wishes and I am now the proud owner of hand-printed CTHULHU UNDERWEAR. What could be better?

Ice, ice baby

Limiting typing this week to the writing business (okay, and Twitter, because I have an addiction problem). This is because the middle finger tendon on my left hand--and I'm a lefty!--has a cyst on it. Yes, go Google tendon cysts. Better yet, Google bursitis, because those pictures are ewwwwww.

Anyway, trying to be as nice as I can be to my fingers, because I have a lot of typing to do! I've got a project I'd really like to complete this month, which might be challenging because I seem to be adding a new social commitment every three hours.

People like me! They really like me!

Playing around

Last week combined illness and writer's block with the result of zero accomplishments (save sewing a Halloween costume for my daughter and crocheting a scarf for my own Halloween costume). I know it's not popular to admit to writer's block--I feel sometimes that if you say you believe in it, other writing types act as if you've just admitted to believe in the Boogey Man or something equally infantile. I think a better name might be "Brain Tantrums" or "Sick Leave for the Intelligence." Honestly, I've reached a point in my current work/home/jobbing life that I just don't have enough oomph. For the past three years, I've tried to limit myself to one day off a week, a day that I still usually wind up using for editorial work, and it's okay to sometimes admit that I'm tired.

So, I was sick, and then I was tired, and I took a few days off. I will probably take it fairly easy this week, too, focusing on fun projects, like a short story that I'm writing just for me. Or maybe some poetry. And yes, my favorite fun activity: decorating for Halloween! Maybe we'll make another batch of dried apple people. Last year's (pictured above) turned out great.

I would encourage you to do the same! We all have work and projects and things we have to do, but there's something about autumn that always reminds me that creativity is at its heart a fun activity. If you don't get enough fun in your system, if you don't let yourself creatively play, then your art really suffers.

So peeps--what are some playful creative activities you plan to enjoy?

Why my fat is my feminist issue

I have mixed feelings about my fat rolls. I've been overweight my whole life, with one two- or three-year window of thin-ness, and by and large, I don't mind it. There are even things I love about being chubby.

When I was younger, my fat was a wonderful shield that protected me from prowling men, giving me the space to enjoy doing my own thing. I didn't have to deal with having a boyfriend, because I had no interest pursuing one and none of the males in my high school or college (or even post-college, by and large) would deign to notice a fat chick. I hung out with my friends and read and did homework. I got to be me. How many other teenage girls get to enjoy that? How many adult women? Heck, these days even superheroes have to devote their spare time to pleasing some man!

The thing about being thin and sexy is that you have to give up so much. You have to wear shoes that make your feet hurt. You have to turn down pie and pizza and toast. You have to put down the novel and go out for a run. And if the only thing motivating you is your appearance--and you're me--well, there's really no point. Someplace along the line, it hit me that I didn't give a fuck if people thought I was sexy or not. (Don't get me wrong--I love dressing up and wearing makeup and looking pretty. But it's for me. It's play.) I am a writer, a goofball, a beer drinker, a good friend, a cultivator of trivia. If that wasn't enough for other people, then I honestly didn't need to attract them to me in the first place.

And really, that's what being a feminist is about for me. It's about saying that it's okay for women to PEOPLE. We're not just portable vaginas. We don't exist to be sex toys. We are PEOPLE.

I know I could be healthier. And that motivates me to get out and go for a long walk and try to limit the baked goods to one serving a week and avoid saturated fats. After all, I don't want to invite disease into my life.

But I don't want to be thin and sexy, either.

Green Mars

Guys, I don't have much an update. Why? Because I'm reading Green Mars. It's by Kim Stanley Robinson, one of my favorite authors (his story "The Lunatics," is a real standout in the Brave New Worlds anthology that John Joseph Adams put out). One of the most fascinating things about this book is the way that Mars itself becomes the main character, even though the story is a compilation of different narrators. What connects the wide variety of story lines is Mars and the planet's changes. It's riveting stuff!

Anyway, I'm off to go read. Here's hoping to finish tonight!

ARMORED

So a couple of days ago, I sent off the contract for our Armored story, and then today I see this:

And I gotta say, I wish our story was a little more like that. But there is power armor and there are both animals and backflips, so it's pretty close.