Maybe You Gotta Mourn

This weekend was pretty rough. I worked an event that, from the beginning, was a giant pile of mess. And, by the way? I worked that first day, too. This event was screwed on so many levels, and began not so much with human error, but with a technological fail. Hundreds of people were affected, and the people who could make decisions to try to mend what had broken worked TIRELESSLY to do so. And yes, I played a very small role in this. Even if I didn't make any of the decisions, I came in extra hours to help untangle just a tiny part of the enormous knot. I like puzzles and I'm pretty good at them.

So, for about a month we've been doing our best to fix this broken thing. And maybe not everyone ended up happy. In fact, I'm pretty sure everyone was a least a little bit displeased with some aspect or another. We all tried very hard to do something that was not even possible, and we did it while people yelled at us, called us names, made racist remarks, hung up on us, and made up stories about what said or did.

And it's not that I can't understand where many of these folks were coming from. They only wanted to enjoy a special day with their families. This is something I can understand. I openly sobbed at Old Navy when I learned I couldn't get a flight to Hilo to see Noah compete in the track state championships this past May-- an event in which he would never compete again. And when I did get my butt to Hilo, I couldn't even see him run because I had to catch my flight back to Oahu. I remember sitting in the car, the roof leaking (because it's Hilo, hello, and it rains), in anguish, because should I or shouldn't I try to stay to watch? As it was, I barely made my flight.

And then when I got back, I had to miss Lucy's last hula performance. I have never missed any of them, and the one I missed, they actually PLACED. My daughter sacrificed her knees and feet for that hula, and I didn't get to see it. She has danced since she was five and is no longer dancing, and that moment will not come back.

I know what it's like to miss out. I know the intense disappointment and frustration. I know that all these families were frustrated and angry and sad. I would be too.

But I also know how hard we all worked to try to make things as right for as many people as possible, and as quickly as possible. And if it couldn't be done quickly, it could be done in a reasonable amount of time. We all endured the yelling and cursing and insults when it wasn't even something we had done because we understood what it meant to everyone. We tried to be as accommodating as we could because we thought they deserved it.

I had a phone call yesterday from a woman whose verbal assault, while understandable, felt like I was being pummeled by rough surf. Over and over, she repeated her displeasure, interrupting me when I tried to speak. I could not breathe. And then she asked me questions about how I would personally handle the situation, and I could not answer honestly. To have answered honestly would be to have further upset her because no matter how frustrated or angry I might be, I would not take it out on a stranger on a phone. So I really did want to help her because I could totally empathize, but it's not like I have the authority to do what she wanted nor would it have been fair to the hundreds of other people who couldn't be accommodated.

And so yesterday, Saturday, I spent most of my morning being yelled at, which is probably an exaggeration. I got pummeled all morning. I dreaded answering the phone or making phone calls to  people. It was physically and emotionally draining.

Those shitty feelings, I still carried with me today. I hid at home and ignored my phone. I tried to work out my issues through industry. I did laundry, scrubbed my kitchen, did the dishes. Until I couldn't move anymore without breaking down and crying. I just collapsed on the floor and sobbed. I couldn't stop it, I couldn't help it. I was raw and empty. I had no more fuel left to fight.

The conversation Charlie and I had after helped me put this whole thing into perspective. Sometimes, you know, I think I care too much. I mean, this shouldn't have bothered me like this. That job isn't even my primary job, and I get attitude at all the time by kids I work with. I've worked retail before. I know what it's like. And so I think I care too much sometimes. I can hear so many of your voices telling me to let it go, that it's not worth it. And then Charlie tells me that maybe I shouldn't drop it. Maybe I shouldn't just let it go. Maybe it's something I need to feel and mourn. And when he said that, I suddenly felt so much lighter.

It's not your fault for thinking I care too much or that I shouldn't worry about it. I would likely think the same. I was also afraid that if I showed that it bothered me so much, people would think I was weak. That I couldn't handle it. I also didn't want those people to win-- the ones who called us names, cursed at us, and lied about us. But if you can imagine that you are filled with anger and you unleash it on me, then I become filled with your anger. And now imagine that I talked to one hundred people in a couple of hours and half of them filled me with their anger. And now imagine twelve people filled with the anger of hundreds of people every day that they go in to work.

I'm not writing this to get your sympathy or to talk about how wonderful I am and how terrible those other people were. I'm not trying to stir up more anger or resentment or pity. Many of them were venting their legitimate frustration. I write this now to say thank you to the folks who responded to us with kindness and patience. You could have yelled at us, but you didn't and believe me, it made a difference. When I began my first round of calls, so many of you were sympathetic and kind. Not only did it make our jobs easier, it also inspired us to work harder to help you. Your understanding was like a balm, especially since you didn't have to be so nice to us. You chose to be, and I respected you for it.

I write to remind you that we are all human beings just trying to get by and be happy. I think the real reason for writing this is to purge myself of all that anger I've been collecting for others. It's complicated, you know, because I don't have to hold onto it, and I certainly don't want it, but I still think most of the people who vented should vent. I can't explain it.

Anyway, it looks like it was a lovely event. I saw many smiling faces. I'm happy it's over, and I hope we can attend to the issues so that it doesn't happen again. There's only so much you can ask of people to forgive, and I don't know how we will all fare if we have to endure this kind of aftermath again.

Salvageable Gems or They Can't Suck That Bad All the Time

Here's the very stupid thing I did: I deleted all my files when I deleted Scrivener from my computer. I wanted/needed space, I hadn't touched the manuscript in years, I thought I wouldn't care. I didn't know that I'd decide to revisit the work in earnest, let alone finish it for Nanowrimo. I didn't know that though the versions might have sucked butt, I might find salvageable gems that would make me go, "Wow, I wrote that? I did that?" And yet here I am.

See, when I began writing this tale, I'd only recently begun writing again. Not that I was ever really any good at it, but neither had I finished anything significant to figure that out. Can you still be a writer if you don't write? But anyway. The idea for the story actually came from Lucy and Charlie and this scary Halloween wall hanging we put up each year on the front door. Honestly, it only scares small children who are too impressionable to know better, and yet it was the genesis of my work in progress. They came up with the names and their own intricate stories, and I was so fascinated that I asked if I could make my own adaptation.

So there was already this rich foundation upon which to build, and these characters that are both familiar and foreign, and I thought that if I could pull it off, it would be an awesome story. I became a little obsessed. I began with a short story, which I turned in as an assignment, and then ten pages for final paper in my Creative Writing class. That summer, I researched, outlined, and plotted, but ultimately gave up. It was becoming too cerebral. Furthermore, it started to seem too lofty for my skill level.

I'm not saying now that I was wrong then. That Creative Writing class was really kind of the beginning of my recent education during which I decided that I can and that I want to. The rest of the journey (and it continues still) was about honing skill, picking up strategies, and becoming comfortable with workshopping. And that last bit's a bit important because if you're gonna write for an audience, you kinda need one, and you don't get one if you don't let others read your work.

I also had to learn about myself as a writer, which sounds like one of those douchebag phrases I talked about before, but it's what Charlie might call a Truthitude. This self-exploration called bullshit on my typical excuse: "I can write, but I'm not very creative." Because, why? It's a process. Because even though writing can be a lonely process, I'm not alone. I have an audience if I want one who will give me honest, constructive feedback. Because I write as a writer and not a reader. Because I already know what's in my head (usually), and sometimes that doesn't make its proper way to the page. Because the first draft probably isn't going to be the published draft.

My favorite example about process comes from Cormac McCarthy's writing of Blood Meridian. Now, I'm positive I've written or talked about this with you before, so I won't go into it again, but you can read about the process in this Slate article. The author characterizes the prose in McCarthy's early drafts as being "cramped, the voice toneless and noticeably devoid of that deep brassy register" he's known for. And McCarthy's pretty damned successful. If you weren't aware of his literary prowess, perhaps you're familiar with the films The Road, No Country for Old Men, All the Pretty Horses, or The Counselor.

But I'm not trying to toot his horn. I've only read one of his books and seen two of those movies. My point is that he's a successful writer, by many accounts, a GOOD writer, and yet it can take him some effort to get to the point of publication. Why would I assume I bang out one draft and get the same acclaim? I don't think so.

Back to my manuscript. It was inspired by and began by others, and that used to make me feel bad. I know I'm not stealing, and I know this is still my work. My labor of love. I'm the one writing it down and creating as I go. And that's something I've had to grow into. I had to also gain the confidence to know that I can tackle this project, and the time to further develop my style. Ultimately, I don't know what will come of this. Maybe just a finished manuscript that no one will ever read. The really great thing will be that I'll have a finished story and I'll at least know that I could do it.

The Greater Portion of Being Alive

That's what Bukowski said about waiting. And I'm not Bukowski, but tonight that seems pretty right on to me, and probably to the many good people who got caught in presidential traffic today.

There's something about waiting for a bus when you're really set against walking to your destination, especially when the app says your bus is due in three minutes. "Wow!" you think. "What great timing!" And then five minutes pass and you recheck the app and the timeline has moved back another four minutes, and you still think that's pretty reasonable. What's four minutes? You bust out your container of nuts and raisins because that's all you'll have time for before your ride arrives. But it isn't there yet.

You check the app. Another five minutes? Suddenly it ain't small potatoes anymore.

At this point you wonder if it's worth waiting. Because in the twelve minutes you've waited plus the five more in your near future, you could have walked there already. But you also realize that as soon as you get far enough away from the bus stop that you can't just turn back, the bus will pull up to the curb and pass you by. Ugh!

But how we'll wait for things-- we'll kill the time-- when we're too tired to realize or care we're getting a shitty deal. I mean, I know that bus is always late when I get there on time, and it's always early when I'm en route. I know the app is lying to me when it says three minutes, and yet I think, "This time will be different. This time it really will be three minutes." And it never is!

So as I walked home tonight, after I Biki biked home, after I stood up in the theatre for over eight hours, I still wasn't cursing POTUS for making all the buses late. I thought, "Well, at least I can walk over the freeway to get home." What I really should have been thinking about, though, is what I to write about today. And I did. I thought about time as a relative thing. Because if you told me I'd have to wait nearly twenty minutes for the bus to come, I might have just started walking home right then and there, cursing my good fortune. If you'd told me that even after I'd gotten home, the bus STILL hadn't come, I'd feel relief.

And for Joe Bob and Sally, time means very little until they want something. How they each move through time is very different, though both probably feel its passing as slow and arduous if not sometimes as something to ignore and endure. It seems like a ridiculous thing to juggle all these things, these factors that may never come up in the story but affect it nonetheless. I will likely spend very little time talking about time itself, but it's turning out to be one of the things I think about a lot. How would you experience time if you had an abundance of it. Like, really. What if you had lifetimes?

Anyway, I'm tired and sore and exhausted, but I'm pleased I walked home, and not just because I'd probably still be at the bus stop if I had waited. I imagined I worked off at least part of all those donut holes I shoved in my face on Thursday. What an oinker.

It's a Process and Other Douchebag Phrases

At some point you wonder if what you're doing makes sense. Makes sense in the sense that will people read this? Will people enjoy this? Sometimes the question is much simpler. It's not about other people reading it or liking it, but am I wasting my time? Can I do this? I mean, obviously just about any literate person with enough tenacity can write 50,000 words a month, so this is not the question I'm asking. Rather, do I have enough skill and talent to pull this off? Because the end of the month will come and hopefully I'll have something grand to show for it (and by grand I mean hefty word count, and by word count I mean more than just "I don't know what to write" over and over again).

For Nanowrimo I'd decided to revisit a manuscript I began two years ago in my Creative Writing class under the guidance of a teacher who provided the encouragement and space for me to simply begin. Because though I know it sounds a bit ridiculous, but in order to write fiction, I needed to nurtured as a person and writer. My more recent growth as a creator began with this teacher, and because I trusted her, I followed a path on which I learned to accept writing as a process. It's such a douchebag-sounding phrase, right? But it's easy to dismiss the idea that the first draft isn't going to be publishable and instead demand from oneself that it be perfect. It's had to stop editing yourself on the sentence level, and that's terrible when you haven't even hit the paragraph mark. Creating anything becomes an exercise in futility when you're constantly second-guessing yourself and hitting that delete key.

So, anyway, this work in progress. It's interesting because I haven't read it in years so even though I know wrote it, I don't know what's going to happen! It's kind of amazing. Fortunately, I wrote notes to myself so that I remember where it was going to go. During my last semester of school, we had a few conversations about how you need to let a WIP sit for a day or two before going back to edit otherwise you're just still writing. What is editing? That's another conversation. Well, this story's been sitting unattended for two years, and it sometimes seems like another person wrote it. I see some parts are terrible and so obviously need work. I can't believe this was the final version that I turned in! But that's what I'm saying about this process.

On the other hand, I've been reading Raymond Feist's Riftwar Saga. Apparently, he'd gone back to these already successful books to edit them, resulting in "The Author's Preferred Version." I'm unfamiliar with the unpreferred version, but I have a feeling I'd maybe like those better. These newer editions feel over polished-- maybe something like how I've heard people criticize some music as being over-produced. Feist's writing is so immaculate that I feel led to places and conclusions, and I'm ever aware that I'm in a fictional setting. Think about old Tim Burton films like Beetlejuice or Edward Scissorhands or Pee Wee's Big Adventure and compare to the Alice in Wonderland movies or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Not saying one is better than any other, but you can see a difference.

I've given myself permission to use blogging about writing as part of my Nanowrimo word count. This helps me focus. It's like warming up before a race or perhaps revving the engine on a cold, cold morning. It also reminds me that writing is just writing. It's just words strung together and sentences strung together and then paragraphs. And by the end of the blog, I can feel like a writer again. Like a creator. Like I can do this whether or not you like it because I'm simply sending these words out into the void, just like my stories.