I’ve been hearing terrible reports of people with no idea where they’re to vote today, stemming from an incomplete distribution of reminder cards with the address of their pertinent polling station. The only reason I know where to go is because I caught sight of a pile of plastic-covered cards tucked into the stack of flyers by the front door of our building. I always wonder if mix-ups like this, or the incredibly long time it took my husband and I to change our address on the voters’ list (and they still weren’t certain it would work) are deliberate. And I always wonder what percentage of the citizenship will actually make the effort to go vote. My personal opinion is that it�s a right and a responsibility – I mean, I live here, so I ought to at least pretend I have a say in how the place is run – and if you ignore it, then you really shouldn’t be allowed to complain when the people who end up in power start doing stupid things. Because, you know, they will.
Category Archives: Deep Thoughts
On Convincing Oneself That One Really Is Worth It
Ever feel like you’re racing to catch up with everyone else’s opinion of you?
I do, all the time. Skippy got me thinking about it this morning. Some of it is, “Why do they like hanging around with me so much?”, and some of it is, “I can’t possibly charge that much for my time.”
My husband sat me down last night, took my hands, and said, “Darling, I want to tell you something, and you have to promise to listen. You’re an awesome, awesome person. Far more awesome than you believe yourself to be. You can perceive the awesome in others, so why can’t you perceive it in yourself?”
Well, it’s embarrassing. As kids, we were mostly taught that to accept a compliment was to be selfish. It’s more modest to demur, to protest politely. We were also schooled to believe that pride was a bad thing. So if you were good at something, you weren’t allowed to appreciate your skill, or to even really have fun at it in case you made other people feel bad.
Then, of course, there was the geek factor. If you enjoyed reading, liked to be alone, had any interest in music other than the mainstream, films other than action or comedy, or technology other than a phone and a vending machine, you were uncool, and you resorted to lurking and not calling attention to yourself.
What has all that socialisation produced? A generation of people who have difficulty understanding that they’re cool people. What, me deserve something? (Praise, money, social interest, whatever?) No, no. Please, stop. It’s not just that you’re embarrassing me, you’re actually making me uncomfortable and self-conscious because like so many others, I can’t truly understand why you think I’m so great.
Argh. Scores of us are out there. Scads. Bushels.
It’s probably all connected to how incredibly bad some of us are at selling ourselves. Almost everyone I know hates writing a cover letter for a CV, because it feels like exactly that: selling yourself.
A healthy dose of pride in the self is a good thing. Now, if I could just cultivate it…
The Hours
I saw The Hours yesterday. As I expected, when I walked into my apartment afterwards, my husband looked up at me and said, “Good movie?”
Now, that’s such a misleading question. Usually it means, “Did you enjoy the film?”, but the phrasing also implies, “Was it a well-made film?”, or, “Is it a bad movie?”
So I kind of shrugged and said, “It was thought-provoking.”
“But did you have fun?” he persisted.
What kind of a question is that? The movie is about death, questioning the right to define acceptable quality of life, and who has the right to limit any individual’s choice to end his/her life at any time. No, the film was not “fun”. I didn’t exactly “enjoy” it. But it was excellently directed, edited, and acted, and I could appreciate that, and appreciate the feelings it evoked from me, and the ensuing self-examination that began as the credits rolled.
I gave up. It was a quarter to midnight, and my husband was almost asleep, anyway.
“Yeah. It was a good movie,” I said.
Victory!
Well, we’re both still alive, we didn’t use copious amounts of Kleenex, and nothing valuable got smashed, so I’m calling yesterday’s NaNoWriEx session a success.
I really don’t know who Ceri has edited in the past; most of them must have been arrogant, insecure types, because she’s fantastic at offering creative, constructive advice, and helping you work things out. The point of handing a work like this off to someone else is so that you have a second pair of eyes seeing it for the first time to catch inconsistencies (which, bless her, she did) and take in the work as a whole and see how it balances.
We decided to hand them to each other with a minimal amount of editing, to see if the other reader would catch things we’d already pegged as problems, and sure enough, it was gratifying to hear her point out problems that I had already noted down to address — the resolution of a particular storyline, the use of minor characters in other places, and so forth. The good thing is she also pointed out other ways to resolve problems that I hadn’t seen. Likewise, the problems I talked to her about all seemed to be problems that she was already aware of or had anticipated in some way.
Moreover, Ceri put my mind to rest about things like my characters: she swore that every single one of them was different and an individual, and she loved them all. This made me squiggle with joy because I consider characters one of the most important elements of a story, something too many authors forget. (And for those NaNo participants from Montreal who are wondering: no, I have no clue when any of them were born, and what their favourite colours are. So there.) She also eased my paranoid fears regarding my portrayal of sensitive issues. What I wasn’t expecting was her comment that I had material for one or two more novels about these characters. I specifically did not plan a series, because so many YA novels end up as series — but it’s nice to know that I’ve created a sense of “life goes on”.
So! Back to the laptop! I have to add that penultimate chapter I had decided against in the orginal draft to tie up a couple of loose ends, incorporate her edits and word suggestions, and, well, the next step is shopping it around, isn’t it?
In Which She Muses About Antique Shops
Antiques markets fascinate me.
There are several levels to this fascination. One has to do with the simple experience of walking through a collection of stuff, some of which is really nifty. It�s the other levels that interest me even more, though.
As I walk through an antiques shop I constantly wonder about who owned these items before they ended up here, on a shelf with a clutter of other (mostly) dissimilar objects. If it�s a piece of china or glass, obviously from a set, I wonder where the rest of the set might be � broken? Parcelled out among children, some of whom thrust their share to the back of a dark china cupboard and never think about them again; some of whom pass them lovingly down to grandchildren; some of whom die alone and friendless and whose possessions are sold via estate sale to a variety of dealers? The silent stories lying tucked in among the odd cups and saucers and gloves are legion.
Then there are the items that I recognise. We had a jug like that; isn�t that china pattern the same as so-and-so�s; who had flatware like this? Old tools; old cameras; strap-on ice skates.
And then, there are the people. They flow silently through the little dens created by shelves and walls, hands in pockets, or fingers flitting over bowls and umbrellas and memorabilia. They murmur to themselves, sigh almost soundlessly when they find something that arrests their attention, whisper to one another as they stalk sherry glasses. The face of an eleven-year-old as he rounds the corner and sees a well-kept Victrola with his own eyes for the very first time; the arch glance of the man who spies a butter mold and does not wish to betray his interest as he casually examines a wooden churn nearby; the woman who exclaims aloud with happiness at finding a piece of Depression glass that she had been searching for; all these are, to me, as interesting as the objects themselves. People hunch over collections of objects, shielding them from your eyes until they�ve had the opportunity to scan them ruthlessly first � you never know what might be there, after all, and if a bargain is to be found, they�re to be the ones to find it, by God. Unlike other shops, no one strikes up conversation with strangers; antiques hunting is a very defensive, solitary pursuit.
I saw a first edition of L.M.Montgomery�s Kilmeny of the Orchard priced at ninety-five dollars today. I saw a pewter inkwell desk set for one hundred and thirty five. I saw vintage wedding bands, slimmer than a penny�s width, their gold a warm coppery tone from age, incised with delicate elongated diamonds almost impossible to see. I saw cases of war medals, carefully labelled as to regiment, which saddened me; heirlooms like that should be preserved by family in pride, honour and love. Were they � and the full sets of silverware, and the vintage marquis emerald rings � sold by families reluctant to part with history, but bowing to the need for money and the knowledge that they will never in their lives use these things in a practical fashion?
It�s saddening. Yet, in amongst all the odd jars and empty milk bottles and brass mortars and pestles, does there wait the single cup to complete a tea set, a knife to complete a setting of flatware so that it can once again be used for a dinner party?
Antiques aren�t just to look at. They�re meant to be used, or at the least honoured and kept alive. History isn�t mean to be put on a shelf. It�s to be re-lived.
Christmas At Home
Well, we woke up on Christmas morning to over ten centimeters of snow, so I feel right at home. The drive from Montreal to Toronto was surprisingly good, which should have alerted us right off the bat that a bad storm was looming. (The drive was made infinitely more exciting by four or five unmarked mix tapes donated by Tass, including a seasonal compilation marked only ‘Here I am — Rock Me Like A Candy Cane’, which featured the inimitable juxtaposition of the thrash metal rendition of Silent Night with the innocent Christmas Scat from The Muppet Christmas Carol.) After a dull brown December, though, seeing drifts of white everywhere on Christmas morning is rather aesthetically pleasing. The Weather Channel assures us that the 8 degrees C on Monday and Tuesday will take care of things, much to the grim pleasure of the Torontonians.
I love Christmas with my family; there’s always what amounts to a library under the tree, hidden by pretty paper and sparkly ribbon. The tree this year is a surprisingly effective six foot tall fig tree, wrapped with a single strand of white fairy lights, since their seven-month-old Maine Coon Cat is still at the shiny-things stage. (Despite this clever attempt to protect all things Christmas-y, he tried to climb the fig on Christmas morning, because he could see his new foam rubber ball nestled in the leaves.) As for what kind of library was under said tree, my parents each received three or four books, and this year my husband tore the wrapping off The Art of The Fellowship of the Ring, the hardcover volume of developmental art that he discovered in a bookshop not long ago, which kept him busy for well over an hour. I received both books written on the fiftieth anniversary of the Stratford Festival that I had wanted, as well as the recently released Glenn Gould: A Life in Pictures and the new Anne Rice in hardcover, to offset all of that high-brow Canadian culture. Plenty of chocolate and a new polar fleece dressing gown rounded out my major gains. I’m set for the rest of the winter, now.
The snow was still flying out there when we went to bed, and weatherpersons were predicting a final day’s total accumulation of around twenty-five centimeters. I’m glad; there’s something just odd about a Christmas with no snow. Oh, sure, I’ve had my share of snowstorms in Montreal this fall, throughout November and the early part of December, but I don’t think I could ever live somewhere where it doesn’t actually snow at Christmas. I know, I know, there will be plenty of the stuff throughout January and February. I will be thoroughly sick of it by the time March rolls around. Just think, though, about the quality of light that snow creates. One of the reasons November is usually so dull is because it’s overcast and the bright green of the leaves and grass has faded through rusts to browns. The overall effect is rather depressing. As soon as it snows, though, the light is brighter, refracting through millions of individual snowflakes, bouncing around and creating a warmer, clearer glow.
We still have to brush it off cars, and wade through it to get to the bus stop, and jam hats down over our hair to protect our ears from blowing ice and wind. I know. Overall, though, it’s not so bad. It’s the dampness that creeps into your bones and makes you miserable. There’s a difference, after all. If it would just snow for a week leading up to Christmas, then stop, I’d be happy…
In Which She Muses About Freelancing And Self-Promotion
Sell yourself, don’t sell yourself short.
A lady whose opinion means a lot to me said this to me yesterday as we talked about my move into the freelance world, and this editorial position on the magazine staff. The work world is changing, and my generation seems to be the one that, as usual, has to strike a balance of some kind between the world of our parents’ generation and the world that the people fifteen years behind us will take for granted. In this case, it’s the realisation that we have to market our skills to a variety of places simultaneously, because our skills are theoretically valuable. They’re not valuable enough to build an entire job position around, however.
Hence the rather catchy phrase. As a freelancer, you do indeed have to sell yourself. And I’m terrible at that. I ‘m innately shy, and usually the last thing I want is to be noticed. When you’re seeking freelance work, however, that’s precisely the opposite of what you’re trying to do.
My strengths, of course, lie in the copy-editing and proof-reading areas. Areas which, amusingly enough, many tech writers and copy-writers I’ve met absolutely detest. It’s second-nature for me; sometimes I joke that I was born with a red pen in my hand. It’s an ideal situation, actually; the writers hand their work off to me with a sigh of relief, and I get work that I enjoy and that I do well.
In January, I’ll be polishing up my C.V. and passing it along to a bunch of people and places. I’ll agonise over a confident and clearly communicative cover letter (I hate cover letters) that announces my brilliant capability with style.
And, damn it, I’m going to publish. I have two and a half novels written since July alone, and over seventy single-spaced pages of notes on an esoteric non-fic reference book.
That lady whose opinion means a lot to me is right. I sell myself short. Most of us do. I think it comes from a combination of things, not the least of which was growing up in a world where you were polite, and never boasted, or said you were better than someone else, a world which taught us that if we were good, things would come to us on their own. Now, things have changed: the world has taught us that we have to shout louder than the next person in order to be heard, we have to show off in order to move ahead. Is it any wonder that people around thirty or thirty-five are so confused, and are one of the highest age demographics of the unemployed?
There are times when your mother tells you you’re special, and you think she’s saying it just because she’s your mother. And then, there are the times where she says it as one person to another, and you hear it in an entirely different way. I am talented. And I am special.
Thanks, Mum.