It could've been in a world where good things happen to me. / Well, that's not really where we live.
Catching up on this month's meme:
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
I don't know who my youngest character is. The youngest I can think of is Ada from (the first half of) Seal Girl. She was supposed to be in fifth grade, I think (I could just check - it specifies it right in the text, but why be exactly certain when you can be roughly accurate?) but I'm not sure if she's negated as "youngest character" because we fast-forward to when she's 21 and... kills herself. Fun times. Anyway. I write a lot of teenagers. Lutz and Corey in Moonward are 17/16; Ann(wn) from Waning is... I don't know. She was originally supposed to be 17, but lately I keep thinking of her as a 15-year-old. But that would have some uncomfortable implications for readers who don't quite understand the Rook plotline, and that's apparently ...everybody.
My oldest character is Diana "Memaw" Case from Waning. She was (is?) in her early 80s and pretty awesome. I'M NOT SURE ABOUT TENSES TODAY. It's customary to write about literary characters in the present tense, yes? But then... what if they die in the story (I don't kill off my characters very often, so I really have no idea) or have a significant age-jump (even though it was poorly done)? Yeah, probably still work in present tense as much as possible/logical.
My oldest character in terms of when I created them would be I have no goddamn idea. My youngest would be Roma from Volk, which I have... written very little of.
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol’ pen and paper?
I really prefer the feeling (and the clickety-clackety sound) of writing on the computer, but I get more done with pen and paper. I wrote the first 8 pages or so (of the full 10 pages) of the robot story [a.k.a. The Electric Wife, but I'm really used to just calling it "the robot story"] with pen and paper over a period of about 36 hours last year.
A lot of the time I lie to myself and pretend that I can get work done in the evening. This is just not true. I can write lot after 7 pm, but it's not going to be good or coherent or semi-logical. I need a Room of My Own and daylight.
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
YYYYEEEESSSSS. I have made a few playlists specifically for stories and occasionally for specific characters or pairings.
I listened to my main Pandora station for Waning, and Larkin Grimm's "One Hundred Men" came on so often that I started to associate the song with Memaw's character.
Back to the nonfiction flop that is my life of unemployment and celibacy! I finally got to see 500 Days of Summer tonight. Day 488 I found really interesting. She says she kept thinking, "Tom was right," and I wonder how much consolation that gave his character - to know that he was there, in a way. That he had some sort of influence in her life even after they split up. I don't know what other people's interpersonal goals are - I'm very attached to the anxiety that the people who get to own space in my heart will not remember me, will not ever think of me in a spontaneous way or without me saying "hey" first or something and giving them a legitimate reason to remember who I am. Recently, I guess I got to have some relief from that, from two different sources, one I haven't spoken with since 2006. For two people I have been almost violently myself with to remember me for what I am and what I've said - I'm grateful to the point where I'm astonished that I am not crying.
The loss of faith that Tom goes through I find exquisitely relateable. We want to feel like we can trust our "gut," as they say - that when we "just know" something, it's fact or destiny and it'll work out and we're in some maze that will bring us together eventually even if our paths diverge early on. And when Things That Actually Happen bring us to a place opposed to the place we were going in Things We Believed Would/Wanted To Happen Land, it just feels like we lied. Like we must have been wrong all along, there must have been something we overlooked, something that was off from the beginning - there must be some reason that a chapter, whether long or short, was ripped from our lives, crumpled up, and thrown in the wastebasket.
But I don't think we lie all that much. I am not House. :) We can lie to ourselves a lot, and maybe I only believe in the intrinsic Goodness of gut-listening because I want to believe in it and not because it's treated me well, but even if I am only an optimistic as a coping mechanism, it's the way I'd rather be. Only living makes us seem wrong for believing that some specific person is "right" for us - we live to the point when they disagree, or when suddenly we feel that all the figurative sunshiny days our lives had were actually overcast all along because we've found a brand new sun.
I'm surprised - and very, very glad - that life feels more amplified now than ever and that it always is that way. Current pain must appear to be the worst so far because it happens now, and all past pain must appear easier because it's faded or vanished or just plain not applicable - and the same with happiness, I think. One Thursday last month, I smiled and didn't know why and that felt like the most incredible thing because it happened after what seemed to be the worst wallowing of my experience, but my Moment of Clarity after the 2008 break-up was also the most amazing thing to me when it happened. It seems that life gets progressively worse and better, and better because it's worse and worse because it's better, and isn't that gorgeous? I love it; I really do. And there is no way, no way no way no way!, to invest less of myself than I did before, even if only because there is more to me than before. There is no excuse to be bitter forever, and no excuse to deny myself the experiences that I want. I am not a "Summer" - I opt for "serious" relationships over nameless ones, and I like to invest myself in other people. I should be able to do that, and I should be with someone who wants that both ways.
Also, if - some day in futuretimes, if when I'm with someone again - I ever mention that a boyfriend refuses to go bowling with me, unless he has some very specific allergy, just tell me to break it off right then. I can't abide that not-bowling silliness. :)
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
I don't know who my youngest character is. The youngest I can think of is Ada from (the first half of) Seal Girl. She was supposed to be in fifth grade, I think (I could just check - it specifies it right in the text, but why be exactly certain when you can be roughly accurate?) but I'm not sure if she's negated as "youngest character" because we fast-forward to when she's 21 and... kills herself. Fun times. Anyway. I write a lot of teenagers. Lutz and Corey in Moonward are 17/16; Ann(wn) from Waning is... I don't know. She was originally supposed to be 17, but lately I keep thinking of her as a 15-year-old. But that would have some uncomfortable implications for readers who don't quite understand the Rook plotline, and that's apparently ...everybody.
My oldest character is Diana "Memaw" Case from Waning. She was (is?) in her early 80s and pretty awesome. I'M NOT SURE ABOUT TENSES TODAY. It's customary to write about literary characters in the present tense, yes? But then... what if they die in the story (I don't kill off my characters very often, so I really have no idea) or have a significant age-jump (even though it was poorly done)? Yeah, probably still work in present tense as much as possible/logical.
My oldest character in terms of when I created them would be I have no goddamn idea. My youngest would be Roma from Volk, which I have... written very little of.
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol’ pen and paper?
I really prefer the feeling (and the clickety-clackety sound) of writing on the computer, but I get more done with pen and paper. I wrote the first 8 pages or so (of the full 10 pages) of the robot story [a.k.a. The Electric Wife, but I'm really used to just calling it "the robot story"] with pen and paper over a period of about 36 hours last year.
A lot of the time I lie to myself and pretend that I can get work done in the evening. This is just not true. I can write lot after 7 pm, but it's not going to be good or coherent or semi-logical. I need a Room of My Own and daylight.
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
YYYYEEEESSSSS. I have made a few playlists specifically for stories and occasionally for specific characters or pairings.
I listened to my main Pandora station for Waning, and Larkin Grimm's "One Hundred Men" came on so often that I started to associate the song with Memaw's character.
Back to the nonfiction flop that is my life of unemployment and celibacy! I finally got to see 500 Days of Summer tonight. Day 488 I found really interesting. She says she kept thinking, "Tom was right," and I wonder how much consolation that gave his character - to know that he was there, in a way. That he had some sort of influence in her life even after they split up. I don't know what other people's interpersonal goals are - I'm very attached to the anxiety that the people who get to own space in my heart will not remember me, will not ever think of me in a spontaneous way or without me saying "hey" first or something and giving them a legitimate reason to remember who I am. Recently, I guess I got to have some relief from that, from two different sources, one I haven't spoken with since 2006. For two people I have been almost violently myself with to remember me for what I am and what I've said - I'm grateful to the point where I'm astonished that I am not crying.
The loss of faith that Tom goes through I find exquisitely relateable. We want to feel like we can trust our "gut," as they say - that when we "just know" something, it's fact or destiny and it'll work out and we're in some maze that will bring us together eventually even if our paths diverge early on. And when Things That Actually Happen bring us to a place opposed to the place we were going in Things We Believed Would/Wanted To Happen Land, it just feels like we lied. Like we must have been wrong all along, there must have been something we overlooked, something that was off from the beginning - there must be some reason that a chapter, whether long or short, was ripped from our lives, crumpled up, and thrown in the wastebasket.
But I don't think we lie all that much. I am not House. :) We can lie to ourselves a lot, and maybe I only believe in the intrinsic Goodness of gut-listening because I want to believe in it and not because it's treated me well, but even if I am only an optimistic as a coping mechanism, it's the way I'd rather be. Only living makes us seem wrong for believing that some specific person is "right" for us - we live to the point when they disagree, or when suddenly we feel that all the figurative sunshiny days our lives had were actually overcast all along because we've found a brand new sun.
I'm surprised - and very, very glad - that life feels more amplified now than ever and that it always is that way. Current pain must appear to be the worst so far because it happens now, and all past pain must appear easier because it's faded or vanished or just plain not applicable - and the same with happiness, I think. One Thursday last month, I smiled and didn't know why and that felt like the most incredible thing because it happened after what seemed to be the worst wallowing of my experience, but my Moment of Clarity after the 2008 break-up was also the most amazing thing to me when it happened. It seems that life gets progressively worse and better, and better because it's worse and worse because it's better, and isn't that gorgeous? I love it; I really do. And there is no way, no way no way no way!, to invest less of myself than I did before, even if only because there is more to me than before. There is no excuse to be bitter forever, and no excuse to deny myself the experiences that I want. I am not a "Summer" - I opt for "serious" relationships over nameless ones, and I like to invest myself in other people. I should be able to do that, and I should be with someone who wants that both ways.
Also, if - some day in futuretimes, if when I'm with someone again - I ever mention that a boyfriend refuses to go bowling with me, unless he has some very specific allergy, just tell me to break it off right then. I can't abide that not-bowling silliness. :)