i ain't no hero

[musesfool]

My niece and nephew came over and we had a nice family game of May I, which possibly was one of the most intense games I've played. We started out this time with four decks of cards instead of the usual two (we always have to add at least one more for the last hand anyway), so you'd think it would have been easier, but no. It's like, you KNOW there

Comments

[soundingsea]

If I like someone's writing, I don't generally stop liking it all of a sudden. I do, however, read fic at highly sporadic intervals, due to my extreme lack of time. Somehow I doubt I'm the only person in that boat

[musesfool]

Everything you're saying makes sense and I understand it and often tell myself the same things. But I also understand that all the actual reasons people don't leave fb don't always work in the face of an OMG EVERYBODY HATED MY STORY freak out, and I think most of us have had those at one time or another. And I just think it's weird that the general fandom norm is to pretend like we don't.

[soundingsea]

When I was new to LJ, I posted some kind of challenge story incorrectly - early, I think? - so I went and privatized the entry. Then a couple of days later I went, edited it, changed the date, and made it public.

As you can imagine, nobody saw it. But I didn't understand why, and I pretty much freaked out. I was able to laugh at myself... eventually. I still remember how the bottom fell out of my stomach when I saw that I had zero comments.

I think that's happened once or twice since then, but fortunately, I got my first experience with that particular trauma out of the way early!

Hmm, I wonder if the norm is so we can try to look all cool and casual, like we don't care? Because yeah, that's obviously completely unrealistic.

[musesfool]

Eek!

Last fall I posted to a comm and forgot to actually include the link to the story, and then I was like, wow, I guess this pairing was even less popular than I thought. *facepalm*

But that kind of technical error provides a lot more peace of mind than just not getting a hoped for response, or even the response you've become accustomed to.

I've learned over the years to manage my expectations down, but sometimes I am still stung by it, and it takes me a few days to get over it.

I wonder if the norm is so we can try to look all cool and casual, like we don't care? Because yeah, that's obviously completely unrealistic.

I think that's part of it, and I also think that in a mostly female space, a lot of us have been conditioned towards the kind of modesty that doesn't allow us to take pride in our work or enjoy accolades for it, and to admit to wanting praise is unseemly and arrogant and entitled.

[seperis]

I'm told there is a zen state where people don't have these freak outs, but I am still not sure I believe it exists for more than fleeting moments of time. Maybe someday I will get there for more than a week or two.

There's a Zen place? I want to find that.

[musesfool]

I've found it on occasion; I've just never been able to stay there.

[inksheddings]

even when a story is good (or better than good) you just don't get lucky, and there is absolutely no discernible reason why.

Yes. It's always the stories that I'm immensely proud of, that I'm in love with, that I seem to receive the least feedback on. It can be frustrating, and I've thrown my share of curse words, but what can you do? *laughs*

[musesfool]

*nod nod*

I always eventually come around to laughing, but it's hard sometimes, especially when you do think you've hit one out of the park, and there's just *crickets* in response.

[minim_calibre]

My, those are perky.

Niiiiiiiiiiiiiice cookie.

When my relationship with feedback (by which I mean, any, including beta feedback) gets too weird, I start writing crackfic for my eyes only. Only now, I'm doing it on my phone. So my phone contains a lot of weird, short, utterly random self-indulgent DA fic. And I still have feedback to answer from July.

I think I need to hone my feedback coping mechanisms.

[musesfool]

I figured the cookie would deflect any kind of unpleasantness. *g*

And you know you should send me some of that crackfic, if it is Max/Alec, or Alec and Cindy.

[minim_calibre]

I need to bite the bullet and get a new battery for my laptop, so I can email this crap to myself, polish it (and double the word count, as things in iPhone form tend to be somewhat shorter than they should be), and post it. I really do.

(Hell, I think I started one of them for your birthday, thinking I'd have time to finish it. Ahahahahaha. Work. It eats me.)

[musesfool]

You really do!

[vee_fic]

I... just don't get it. I see you post on feedback and your insecurity about it about every three months and I find it totally baffling how much energy you spend on the topic.

In general, I do find public discussions of feedback expectations unseemly, because the cumulative effect is to create the impression that it's all a numbers game, that it's a competition, that value and popularity are the same thing. Which has nothing to do with my experience of feedback (giving it or getting it), and is a stance I violently disagree with. Maybe you disagree with it too; but the way you phrase your italicized internal monologue, you appear to be buying into those underlying assumptions.

[musesfool]

I am a charming bundle of insecurities, really. *g*

I don't buy into those underlying assumptions intellectually, but I think sometimes emotionally it is hard not to. I am pretty well aware of all the reasons people do or don't leave fb, and well aware that those reasons are not generally a reflection on any particular story in and of itself, because there are so many other variables involved. But there have been times when that hasn't really mattered because I've felt that they were. It's not rational, but it is real. And I think not talking about it at all makes people feel even worse when they do feel disappointed in the response a story receives, like they're not allowed to feel that way. I'm not talking about the "I won't write anymore if I don't get X number of comments" people, either, though I imagine it might appear that there isn't a real difference.

[vee_fic]

It's perfectly cromulent to feel that your story deserved more recognition than it got. But it's still graceless to say it in public, especially to the faces of the people who gave or withheld that recognition.

I mean, this is not talking to a neutral third party, here. The people who read your ordinary posts are the same people who are reading your fiction. We are the people who failed to give you the feedback that would satisfy you. To claim that your musing does not carry within it the kernel of an accusation is disingenuous.

So unless you really want to accuse -- that is, to act wanky and entitled, which I do trust is not your intention -- then no, there is no polite way to air the topic in public.

[musesfool]

Okay, I admit, I hadn't thought of it as an accusation, and that's the last thing I'd want. Huh.