dreams

Hey Artist, Got A Dollar?

Series 1923 U.S. 1$ Silver Certificate, Friedberg #237, S/N R91110043B (Photo credit: LostBob Photos)

I love Rent. The lyrics, the music, the message, the whole package. Me and eleventy billion other people. But this line, the title of today’s post, always resonates.

Why are creative types, artists, writers, musicians, etc, expected to be poor but happy? The scene in my head is old and familiar, a talisman and a warning sign spooning together; the gaunt, pale writer pounding away at a dinged up typewriter in a rat infested garret in Paris, overflowing ashtray on either side of her. Mmm, yeah, that was the romanticized image I had at 15. Not working for me anymore. Never got to France, more broke than I was at 15, a dinged up laptop, but still, I write. What I don’t do is romanticize an unsuccessful creative life. Great if you lived at the turn of the 20th century with a zillion lovers and a wealthy patron who bought your meals, paid your rent, and you didn’t mind dying of syphilis. Today, as a married mother of three who’s never known anyone to have a patron? Not so much.

Poor but happy is bullshit. Wealthy may not mean happy, but no one is happy when they’re hungry, or worried about paying the rent.

Writing, whether it’s fiction, nonfiction, journalism, or blogging, is interactive. I write, you (hopefully) read. More hope, you get on the phone and tell a couple of friends about this fun or moving piece you read, and they read.

PFC Gladys Bellon, Basile, Louisiana, one of the 27 WAC switchboard operators flown from Paris for the Potsdam… – NARA – 199010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

And so on. Until…more hope…I make a dollar. Ah, I’ve changed the equation, made it dirty. Because I’m not supposed to care about how many people want to read what I’ve written, or earning money. Why? My kids get hungry. This may be shocking, but they want to eat multiple times a day. And whether I like all aspects of today’s American society or not, I was raised in it, I live in it. And in our society, money is necessary, and it’s validation. Most published authors don’t earn enough to support themselves through their writing, but it makes a difference in how writers view themselves, and how others view them.

True, there are a few writers, artists, singers, and the like who don’t care about an audience. But the dirty truth is, most of us do. That’s why, for as many books as you’ll find on the shelf about how to write, there are an equal number on how to catch an agent’s attention, how to craft a query letter, how to get published. Lots of opinions on those who are published, and God forbid, successful. He’s a hack. She’s a sell out. She’s a tramp. Oh wait.

A real woman will die a virginal death, and a real writer will die with 6 Pulitzer-worthy manuscripts under the bed. Both, of course, will die at the age of 27 by their own hand, because despair and depression befitting their station in life will have set in. That or consumption. But, they were both pure.

On the other hand, go to a party or a PTA meeting and tell people you’re a writer. Then they ask what you write and where they can find your work. Unpublished. Sneer. You’re a wannabe. Then they tell you about their prize winning 5th grade essay. Which is it? Am I pure or a wannabe? Unsuccessful? Plain old delusional? Trade secret, I’m breaking the rules here. If you are really working on, or going to pursue, publication, don’t blog or write about not having been published, the agents and editors will be scared off. Well, I’m forty thousand and I’m cranky, so I’m breaking the rules.

Yes, there are rules and guidelines. Because the publishing world is a business. A business that likes to make money. Yes, if you’re good enough, or successful enough, you can break those rules. But good and successful are often synonyms for profitable. Because (reputable) agents don’t earn any money if their writers don’t. And editors don’t keep their jobs if they only get behind books that don’t earn out. Those in the publishing world want writers who have talent, dedication, an ability to absorb and apply critiques and edits, and look respectable at writing conferences.

Cocktail Party At The Imperial Hotel: March 13, 1961 (Tokyo, Japan) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Back to that party and the elegantly coiffed woman in the classic little black dress. What you write will effect the curl of her lip. Literary fiction? A delicate raise. Romance, sci fi, or other genre fiction? You’ll get the lip, the nostril, and the eyebrow. Readers, writers, even some who are functionally illiterate, feel free to dis genre fiction. Trash, bodice rippers, pulp fiction. Not only would this lovely lady not admit to reading any of this, she believes her chihuahua could dance across the keys of her laptop, produce one of these manuscripts and have it be publishable. No. Writing is an art, writing is work, and marketable, popular fiction is deceptive in its “simplicity.” There’s a reason genre fiction is also called popular fiction. Quality literary fiction; also an art, also work.

Good writing produces work that people want to read. They want to read it because it has a message that hits home, a universal truth wrapped inside a character you’d like to be, saying the words you wish you’d said. It breaks your heart and performs an angioplasty because it tells the story of a pain you’ve lived, and lets you know others have lived it too. It takes you to another world, lets you be a hero, allows you to experience that first love, again.

Not all good writing gets published, but if it isn’t sold or published, it isn’t because it was too good or too pure.

One day, when a homeless woman calls out to me from her blanket nest on a cold sidewalk, “Got a dollar?” I’d like to say yes, and I earned it from my art.

Homeless NYC (Photo credit: Delusion Productions)

Huzzah!

RenFaire 2012-parade

What else would a family of nerds do for their splurge day? Celebrate with hundreds of other fringe folks at the renaissance fair, of course. Yes, it’s true, I confess, I love ye olde faire. We hope to go every year, but it’s an expensive day, so we usually get there every other year or so. There’s something about the day of fantasy; the guys hawking huge pickles making bawdy jokes, the actors walking around, staying in character as they ad lib, and the costumes, oh the grand and glorious costumes.

First stop–always–Flower Child gets her hair braided.

Cascading Crown Braid

For this fabulous crown, we waited an hour and a half. Ludicrous, sure. Just the type of thing where Mrs Fringe would keep a tight hold on the girl’s hand and say, “absolutely not.” But it’s RENFAIRE!!!! It’s also a lovely way for her to ease into the day, she can sit in the shade, watching the actors–and guests– walk past in their costumes. Because, of course, the braiding booths are just past the entrance. The women doing the braiding love Flower Child, she waits patiently and doesn’t fidget, swing her head around, or bop up and down while they’re braiding. Part of her disorder involves excessive fatigue, so this is an excellent “activity” for her. We only have the front half braided, whatever design she gets, and she does have beautiful hair that goes past her waist, she’s an excellent walking ad for them once we’re done.

For a large gathering of many people on often crowded pathways, with alcohol and weaponry being sold, it’s amazingly…friendly. Kinda like Disney World, only with peasants, elves, fairies, and wenches instead of Mickey, Cinderella, and Pooh. It feels safe, inside this dusty nerdland bubble. Heavyset women are applauded, as their generous boobage is the perfect accessory to the low cut costumes; any child or adult in a wheelchair is bowed down to, gawky teenaged boys are engaged in long conversations, often involving dungeons and dragons references, about swords and catapults, hilts and scallywags.

It is a great teaching opportunity for children, any and all rides and games are powered by hand, history and mythology lessons abound. However, purists need not bother. I had a friend who is a history buff attend with her kids one year, she was horrified. Renaissance costumes and wares are mixed with medieval, age of exploration, and Camelot. Turkey legs and mead are sold alongside lattes and quesadillas, pewter figurines and wooden staffs next to earrings made from Swarovsky crystals and belly dancing costumes.

We don’t stroll in and forget the budget, but we don’t go unless we are ready to pay for just enough to make it a stress free, special day. There are plenty of customers dropping hundreds, sometimes I think it must be thousands, on elaborate costumes, accessories, and general tomfoolery that when I say something is out of budget, we aren’t pressured by anyone, and are free to look at everything.

I’m not sure why I enjoy this so much, there’s no sand, no ocean, and if the day is hot it can be uncomfortably ripe. Actually, I’ve never been a fan of historical romance for this reason, I can’t suspend disbelief enough to stop thinking about how long it’s been since the hero bathed, the heroine had the nits removed from her hair, and the stench of manure on a forbidden moonlit ride. But it’s straight fun, pretending that one day we’ll all be outfitted in pantaloons, cloaks, and feathers, hearing the serving wenches’ voices ring out as they jump up and down to maximize and flash the aforementioned boobage, “Huzzah for the generous tipp-ah!!!”

want

Missing: My Lost Love, Fiction

The Missing Piece (book) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’m not mourning this one. I refuse. She’ll come back, I’m sure of it. Have you seen her? She’s a master of disguise, sometimes wearing a ragged old jacket, pages so worn they’re soft and fuzzy, sometimes a sharp and spiffy hardcover, crackling when she flashes that first page. She has another angle I used to know well, flowing from half a thought in the shower out through my keyboard, gaining heft in pages each day. The perfect companion, able to reflect every mood, never moaning that I don’t accept her as is, sharper and stronger when I mark her with the pencil; cutting, editing, resculpting. The best part about her is the way she can be completely, totally yours, and still shared with countless others, solidifying the feeling that you aren’t alone, and have a place in the world.

Venetian courtesan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bah. I’d say that’s enough purple prose, don’t you think? I was always one of those; loved to read more than anything else, would skip meals, sleep, outings, just about anything to stay immersed as long as possible in a good book. As a kid I loved the typical girlie classics: Black Beauty, the Little House on the Prairie Series, Little Women. The first book I remember reading is The Lonely Doll, and I read it over and over. I found it again several years ago and purchased it, intending to read it to Flower Child. Ummm, no. I’m more than a bit horrified by how much I loved that book, there’s something dark, maybe even salacious in those pages. I promptly read a biography of the author, Dare Wright. The bio did much to explain the storybook, but again, I won’t be using it as a bedtime story.

The Lonely Doll (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

(Flower Child is sitting next to me, on seeing this ^pic, she said, “She can be my doll.” Have I mentioned no?)

I found Ordinary People in the library when I was ten or eleven, read it, loved it, wrote a book report about it, had my parents called and I was told to do a different report on a different book.

I also discovered category romance about the same time. An elderly neighbor (fabulously French, served fresh lemonade) of a relative who lived in California belonged to the Harlequin book club. After visiting, she shipped me four cartons of those books. I tore through them like a bag of chips, licking the salt off the foil at the end. Then came science fiction, fantasy, horror, and my forever love, Stephen King.

I found Margaret Atwood and Joyce Carol Oates and felt something I couldn’t define, something profound and spiritual, but at the same time they felt so real, so rooted in the collective consciousness it was my youthful vegetarian self tearing into a raw chunk of beef. Sylvia Plath, Ernest Hemingway, Virginia Woolf, Truman Capote, the list goes on. The poetry years, ee cummings, Anne Sexton, Edna St Vincent Millay….

Bookshelf (Photo credit: heipei)

Throughout the reading was the writing. Mostly short stories, several years of angsty poetry, and later, full length manuscripts.

Broke or flush, content or heartbroken, writing or reading, fiction has been my lifelong companion. Different genres for different phases of life, different moods. I wouldn’t say I was indiscriminate, but rather, I’ve had broad tastes; seen value, worth, and beauty in the different styles. So what the heck? My purse is lighter, no novel shoved in there. My end tables are neater, no texts I’m using for research toppling over. Flashes of scenes that need to be written rinse away with the shampoo. I’m singing a torch song, looking for my love. And let me tell you, my off key warble is nothing you want to hear for long. Think Edith Bunker.

Smithsonian American History Museum (Photo credit: Steve Tatum)

Dear Mama Fringe,

Mail box (Photo credit: Mark Sardella)

I hate the mail. Nothing good ever comes. Well ok, sometimes there’s a nice surprise. As email takes the place of snail mail, it’s beginning to be the same. Bills, obligations, and bad news.

Sometimes I check my email as it comes in, others, especially in the summer, I only check it once a day or so. Last night it occurred to me I hadn’t checked it all day, so I decided to throw off any chance of a decent night’s sleep by opening the inbox.

Boring back story that would be eliminated or cleverly worked in if this was a piece of fiction: I have one connection in the writing/publishing world. Perhaps it’s more of a connection to a connection, but still. This is a brilliant, well respected, well established writer. One evening we were chatting, and she offered to look at some of my work. Sure there might have been a glass or two of wine involved, but it was an offer I took her up on. I know there are many unpublished writers who work every hint of a connection like a cat working over a cockroach, but I’m not one of them. Not because of any sense of decorum, probably from fear and not wanting to ruin the original relationship in the first place.

There was a time in my life when I diligently pursued a writing career. I woke up and did some editing every morning of the previous day’s work, then wrote for at least a few hours, then spent time crafting and mailing query letters, partial submissions, etc. I belonged to a writer’s association, a critique group, and attended a few conferences. Rejection is part of writing. A big part. If you take each rejection to heart, stop now and give up. Some people find journaling is more their speed, perhaps even blogging.

I didn’t develop the courage to take myself seriously enough to take these steps until I was well into adulthood. Some might say middle aged. I had three children and a husband when it occurred to me my dreams of being a writer were never going to happen if I didn’t DO it. Writers write. And they submit. I was lucky. Many writers submit for years before seeing more than a form rejection–and if you aren’t familiar with the business, there are nuances to rejection (though not as many as new writers believe). There are form letters, form letters with an encouraging handwritten note written across the bottom, personal rejections, rejections with an “invitation” to submit other work; then there is interest, requests for partial manuscripts, hopefully followed by requests for full manuscripts, hopefully followed by an acceptance.

I received encouraging handwritten notes, personal rejections, invitations to submit other work (does everyone assume every unpublished writer has 12 other manuscripts under their bed?), requests for partials, and even requests for fulls. No acceptances, but I felt like I was getting somewhere, had some encouraging exchanges with a few agents. These were in response to a stand alone romance I had written. Definitely a romance, but off the beaten path. Publishing is a business, very, very difficult to get an agent to take a chance on one of the unwashed and unpublished. Besides the romances, I also write short stories. Not romantic at all, more gritty slice of life type things. Some might call them literary fiction, but in my head that term is linked with being a writ-aaaah. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a forty thousand year old gal from Brooklyn (and not the new, artsy Brooklyn), these are not terms I would use for myself. I submitted a few of my shorts, but no bites. I’ve heard the odds of getting published in a respected literary magazine are smaller than the odds of winning the lottery. I have no BFA, MFA, or known and respected literary workshops in my credits. I just write.

Typewriter (Photo credit: toastytreat87)

Cue the violins. I was continuing submissions and had begun work on a new manuscript. Not a romance, but a full length piece that followed the style of my short stories. Husband had surgery that didn’t go as expected, rocked my world and my confidence. My parents’ voices rang in my head, how nice, you’re writing, get a union job! Then Flower Child got sick. I was devastated. The day she was released from her first PICU stay, I found a rejection letter for a full in my mailbox. How could I care? How could I have faith in myself, my writing, and the publishing world–yanno, good-writing-trumps-all, if I couldn’t have blind faith that my daughter was going to continue breathing? I stopped submitting, and the work of writing became sporadic.

So here was this potential opportunity in front of me, and a younger, tougher me was knocking on my brain, “Remember when you used to be a person?” My friend liked and respected my work, we even had a meeting like grown ups–oh, how wonderful that felt. She passed one of my stories on to the fiction editor at a well known, high brow magazine. What if???? Friendship only goes so far, and she wouldn’t have risked her own reputation facilitating the submission if she didn’t believe the work was quality. After many months, I received a reply yesterday, seen last night.

Rejection. A nice, personal rejection that praised the writing and the story itself, but alas, she didn’t see the piece as right for the magazine.

Shit.

Orange, broken typwriter (Photo credit: paulgalipeau.com)

Plans vs Dreams

Vintage Chenille Designer Fabric Girl Patchwork Quilt with Fuchsia Fringe (Photo credit: Nesha’s Vintage Niche)

Mmm hmm, we’re all human, want to love and be loved, put our pants on one leg at a time; insert whatever cliche feels right to you here. But there are differences between those who worry about paying the rent and those who don’t, same as there are differences between men and women. Then again, maybe it’s just me.

I don’t make too many plans, but for as much as I lecture myself not to do it, I still dream. I dream of my beach house, I dream of a 135 gallon tank stocked with the flashiest fish and corals money can buy. I dream of buying my kids everything they need when they need it, I dream of a brand new fully loaded van, a little hybrid for myself and another one for Man Child. I dream of being able to take Flower Child to the absolute best doctors to maximize her quality of life and her joy, no matter where they might be, or how much it would cost, of being able to search out and pay for a school that truly fits her needs. I dream of Virginia Woolf, and being able to say yes, I have a room of my own to write in, and the time to do so. I dream of indulging the shoe whore who lives inside me, letting her out. I dream of being able to say to the fabulous fancy schmancy schools that have given scholarships to my boys, “Here, take it back. Let me write you a check x 2, so you can offer scholarships to two more kids who need and deserve their shot.”

Dreams don’t cost anything, some would even argue they’re food for the soul. I’m not sure which side of that argument I’d take. Plans, though, plans are something else. Plans are what people do when they have enough, and some extra. When decisions aren’t made out of panic and absolute necessity, but careful thought.

What’s that old saying? Man makes plans and God laughs? I was on Facebook yesterday, trying to catch up on the “news” of my online friends, and saw someone had posted a map of the US, illustrating how many hours would need to be worked in each state at minimum wage each week in order to pay (fair market) rent on a two bedroom apartment. Some were much worse than others, but not one state would afford a two bedroom if you only worked 40 hours. I live here in Gotham City, so that wasn’t exactly shocking. What was shocking were the comments made on the side. So much self-righteousness I was afraid to type a response, surely a viscous sludge that reeked of pomp and circumstance would ooze from between the keys. “Just get another job!…They shouldn’t have had children they couldn’t afford!…Join the army!…Share the apartment with another family!…Who told those people to procreate (yes, I’m well aware I already wrote that, but it was mentioned many times)…Let them go back to their own countries!…”

I don’t know any of the people who posted those comments. I don’t know if they go to the union meeting on Tuesday, the PTA meeting on Wednesday, or church on Sunday. I do know that I, and others I know like myself and my family, used to make plans. It doesn’t take much; the loss of a job, a real estate bubble expanding and then bursting, a diagnosis of a chronic medical condition, to push Average Jane/Joe off the solid weave and onto the fringe. Staying on the fringe and not falling into society’s lint pile, well, that takes a lot. Focus, strength, determination, maybe even the remnants of faith in a better life, possibilities, and dreams.

Is It Appropriate to Mourn a Glass Box?

And would someone please play taps for me?

A bugler plays “Taps” during the funeral of Caspar W. Weinberger, 15th secretary of defense, at his final resting place in Arlington National Cemetery Arlington, Va. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am a reefer. For the uninitiated, reefer is the terminology used for a coral reef ~~addict~~ hobbyist. In a way, even if another definition for reefer comes to your mind, you wouldn’t be completely wrong. It is intoxicating. There is sublime beauty in planning, building, growing, and maintaining a coral reef. There is the obvious, and not to be underestimated, beauty of the fish, live rock, algaes,corals, and assorted critters. There is the chemistry of the water, the additives, the salt used, and the creatures. There is the plumbing, the skimmer, the type of lighting used, manipulation of color for said lighting. From the very first addition of live rock to begin your “cycle,” called scaping, to the first explosion of diatom algae (ugly brown dust), the first pod (reef bugs) population explosion, and up, you’re hosting and growing a complete ecosystem.

And it begins with choosing a tank. Your glass box. Days and nights spent choosing each piece of equipment, planning livestock purchases, learning good husbandry skills, agonizing over the inevitable first loss of life–whether it’s an escaped snail, a carpet surfing fish, or a coral that couldn’t survive in its new environment. My tank is my frustration and my peace, my beach house dream downsized to the reality of broke in Manhattan.

Reefing can be an exorbitantly expensive hobby, but with planning, patience, and good fish freak friends willing to share frags, it can be done on a budget. I bought my first tank and system used, from a local reefer who was “upgrading” to a larger, sleeker, system. He had bought it used a couple of years earlier, so when I got the tank it was third hand at a minimum. Sure there were prettier, fancier systems out there; but (at the time) I could afford this one, which made it perfect. 45 gallon display tank, questionable black metal stand, a 10 gallon sump I immediately switched for a twenty gallon during Petco’s dollar-a-gallon sale, no frills T5 lighting. Yes, perfect. A living chemistry experiment in my living room. I reached out, made other reefing friends, made mistakes, I learned. Hours and hours staring into the tank with a magnifying glass, calling out to Man Child, Nerd Child, and Flower Child to come look when I saw zoanthid pooping, or my snails spawning. I enjoyed success and growth for a few years.

I even fought off the tang police.

Then, a neighbor got bed bugs. All the apartments surrounding the one that was infested has to be treated. I did the best I could, shut pumps, lights out, covered the tank…but the poison got into the system. And so, I experienced my first of what is known in the hobby as a tank crash. My incredible pipe organ– sick, montipora colonies–rapid tissue necrosis, red bubble tip anemone– gone, pocillopora colony–withered; the list went on of corals I had grown out from tiny frags to thriving colonies. I tried nursing the tank along, many generous reefing friends gave frags and colonies, but I was never able to recapture the glory days of this tank. At the same time, our budget got tighter, and I just couldn’t do what needed to be done in order to revive and maintain 65 gallons’ worth of system.

Again, my fish buddies came to the rescue; one sold me a dynamite little all in one 8.8 gallon acrylic tank,pumps and plumbing included for a ridiculously low price, another sold me a sexy as all get out LED light and fixture. I’ve restocked and recrashed, and added 12 dimensions to my patience.

I prefer to think of it as I downsized to an upgrade, rather than I downgraded.

A life long, non-reefing friend had become intrigued, in the meantime. How can you not? Science, beauty, playing God with your own glass box. So, I passed the old system to her, and she has been learning through trial and error, like the rest of us, for over a year now.

Yesterday, she called me. The tank is leaking. Sniffle. A potential disaster that can’t be ignored, she’s going to buy a new tank today, upgrading to a rimless 75 gallon.

OK, one more for my fallen soldier.