Reality Check III: My Generation

Note: Today is not a writerly blog. It's a personal "Here is what I think" blog. Read at your own risk.


I live in the Occupy Wallstreet generation. 


Today's world is terrifying; there is war, rape, murder, muggings, vandalism. The horrifying list just goes on. People blame my generation, all the time. They look at all of us like we're criminals already. They look at people like me, people with lip and eyebrow rings like we're filthy. (Okay, sometimes I forget to shower or don't want to...but for the most part, I'm pretty clean.) 

But really this is the type of person I am;

I hold the door for people. 

I tell people to have a good day.

I may forget to say please but I always try to say thank you.

I go up to strange dogs and pet them because they're cute. 

I put myself through college and obtained a degree in Medical Biology, even when everyone told me to quit because "You're not good at it".

I bought my own car, my first car, without a co-signer at the age of 22, because I left my mom's house when I was 16.

I am the type of person who doesn't usually lock their doors.

I will pick up hitchhikers if it's cold.

I have tattoos, and I have piercings.

I hate hate words, gay bashing, and judging people for what they cannot control.

I WILL defend the underdog (and have almost gotten my ass kicked for it). 

Yesterday while working at the mountain a guest got on my case about picking up hitchhikers because I'm a girl, and in today's society it's not safe. 


It's not safe because we make it not safe. Things happen to people; cars break down, people have to get from point A to point B. I pick up hitchhikers because I believe in the whole "Be the change you wish to see in the world" (~Gandhi). If I were to need to hitchhike, I'd like to think that people like me will be willing to pick me up. When I leave my car unlocked, I try not to panic, because I'd like to think that there are people like me who just walk from their car, into the store, without wanting to break in and steal a GPS. 


My generation is full of unrest. 
We're sick of people stomping on our dreams. We're sick of people telling us to live in reality because we aren't thinking straight. We're sick of hearing about child abusers in the churches and in the schools. We're sick of domestic abuse that goes unreported, because we grew up in those households; I grew up in that household. We're sick of hearing about rape, and murder. We're sick of being the victims of rape and abuse. We're sick of having to lock our doors. We're sick of being afraid to walk the streets at night.


But we don't know how to make this stop, how to make this change. So we camp out, and we protest because we don't know what to do anymore. 


We are the revolution. 
Get ready. Things will change. 


If you don't believe me here are some songs:
City High~City High Anthem
John Mayor~Waiting
Noah Gunersen-Jesus, Jesus
(I had more, but I can't seem to find them....either way, you get the idea)


"Reality's a lovely place, but I wouldn't want to live there" ~Owl City

Skeleton Writing

When I write, I see the story in front of me. You know how when you read, you see the characters move and do what they're doing? It's like that for me when I write; I see the characters interact, what they do, where they go, what happens. I'm in the room with all of these people (which is probably why I fall in love with the guy characters and become really good friends with the girl characters). I'm seeing everything that happens as though I'm there with them. (It's probably why I have such a difficult time with telling rather than showing...).

So, as I write, I write the really basic skeleton. When I finish, there are really basic words, really simple sentences. Originally, Character Defects finished at 73,000 words or so. After a couple of rounds of editing, it's holding strong at 86,000 words. I write this way because it allows me to write fast, and crappily, but have my ideas fully written out on paper. I have each scene written, I know EXACTLY where the story went. Plus, because I know it's weak writing, I have no qualms with completely deleting sections........usually.

An example of skeleton writing:
"And then Jake throws a rock. And then Jake is angry because it hit the tree...rather than the car he was aiming for" etc.  (Note: I promise you the writing isn't this basic, nor does it usually contain that amount of 'and's.) But these lines are what the story is made up of...all of the bones that will help it stand up strong, but at the core, it's missing the meat, the emotional pull of a really good novel.

Usually, it's missing the heart, too.

After the bones are written, I go through and fill in the meaty sections; starting usually with the digestive tract, because let's face it, the second draft is usually poo, too. (This made me really happy to write by the way.  I hope it at least made you smile.)

Round three is where I become the characters, where I see what they see rather than what I see. They're no longer another person, they're a part of me. I have to step into their shoes, feel what they feel when the best friend steals the boyfriend, feel when their bones break.

I can't seem to find the quote I was looking for but it basically says something like; If you don't tear up when you write, your reader won't cry when reading. Feel your work, know your work. It's fun to be someone else for a day. (Until you know, the climax of the story...then...we might all dive in over our heads, but that's why it's crazy fun, right?)

Show And Tell

I have a lot of problems with telling rather than showing when I write. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I write in the first person a lot....but part of it is that my brain just doesn't think that way (especially in the way rough draft).
Plus, until about four months ago, I didn't know what the hell people meant when they said, "Show, don't tell."

The Book Doctor at PNWA, whose name is escaping me, gave a badass example of what showing verses telling is.

I'll share this life altering information with you, with an example I'm gonna make up here on the spot.

Are you ready?
Here it is:

Telling:
Baxter is the best dog, ever. (Of course I'd pick a Baxter reference.)

Showing:

After we'd both undergone surgery, I went upstairs to take a nap. As per doctor's orders, Baxter stayed downstairs after taking some medication. Soon enough, I heard his paws clumsily making their way up the stairs. He staggered to the side of my bed. One paw at a time, he army-crawled onto my blankets, still careful not to be on me. Together we napped, him at my feet, me at my pillow.
When I woke up, blood started pooling out of my mouth. Though Baxter had just gotten his nuts chopped off, and was probably in pain himself, he saw (or smelled? You pick) the blood and started whimpering and nuzzling me until I pet him and told him I was okay.

Do you get the idea? I didn't just tell you Baxter is a ballin' dog, I showed you why. (This may be a kind of lame example, but it's a true one...and it may give you guys some insight as to why he appears so regularly on my blog :) ) The Book Doctor went through and explained examples of when it's appropriate to tell rather than show..but I don't remember when those times are...so once I dig out those notes, I may post about that, too :)

Anyways, hope you guys have a great night. I'm gonna start falling behind on blogging again, I start my new job tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Trusting Yourself

I've gone through two days of hell. After day one, I woke up with what felt like a broken rib and realized that it was because I hadn't used those muscles in over a year. On day two, I panicked in front of my group. I had some votes of confidence, and I allowed myself to learn. The entire time I kept telling myself; I was made for this job, I was born to do this...because well, I am, I was.

This is actually a bad picture to use...I was really hurt in this picture...

After that, I took a day off so that my body could recover. I drank tea, I stayed in sweatpants all day, and I didn't shower. (I also finished my entire thing of mint Oreos, thanks for not judging :) .)

Today, I went back to the mountain, by myself, and snowboarded for two straight hours. And I did it hard. (And started singing some Ke$ha because of the line, "Tonight we're going hard...") While on the chair lift, I started thinking a lot about life, and the applications of snowboarding. I'm constantly terrified because I just had surgery. If I fall wrong, I'm not going to get back up...I'm afraid of turning wrong, of leaning too far...of everything.

The conclusion I came to then, is that writing is a lot like snowboarding. (For those of you who don't know, I've recently been employed as a snowboarding instructor, hence all of this mountain talk. If you're friends with me on facebook, it pretty much says that I like to snowboard and write. So...all of this is rather perfect.)

 There's a point where you stop being scared; where you turn your board out, and barrel down the hill.

After a point, you learn to trust your equipment, your legs (even if they still feel weak, even if you've just had surgery)...yourself. You trust that you know you well enough to know what you're doing. You trust that your board or your bindings won't just come apart. You trust the weather conditions, the mountains...the sport. And you go, because you're at the top of the mountain, and you need to get to the bottom.

But

No matter how good you are, how experienced you are, you never want to throw your body down a mountain. You learn what you're capable of doing and you do it. And you do it until you get bored, until you're ready to learn something new.

Yea, that's right, I work here. Be jealous :)

Writing is no different, my friends. 

You learn to write, and you do it until you realize something just isn't working, something isn't enough. Then you branch off; you start researching your art, you start calling it your art. You admit to being a writer, you're prideful of this fact. You make friends, establish yourself. You don't expect to be a rockstar, you stumble you fall, you get rejected. You don't throw yourself down the mountain (instead, you edit). You ease into it until you know what the hell you're doing.

And when everything falls together, until you can stand on any mountain and say "I own this," you continue along.

Writing isn't a race. Snowboarding isn't a race. Find your pace, and rock it. Maybe sing some Ke$ha if you're up to it. :)

Don't Be Afraid

Being human...well...kind of sucks. And here's why:


We have all of these emotions, all the time. There's never a time when you're not feeling something. Even if you're feeling blah, you're still feeling. But the worst thing (to me) is being afraid. (Now...start singing some Eminem, no, really, sometimes it helps.)

My sister and I thugging out. (I'm on the left, funny, no?)

Anyways, I hate learning new things. More-so, I hate admitting that I don't already know how to do something. Part of it, I think, is ridicule, "You don't know this?" like everyone on the planet already has this knowledge that somehow managed to elude me, that maybe I should have been born with it. Some of it is shame, like I should in fact already know these things... Some of it is just my typical anxiety. 


But, something I've learned over the last few months is to ASK for help. 


Don't be afraid. 


I got a Twitter account and had no idea how to use it. I thought it was like facebook, where you could like stuff and write on people's walls (profiles). Turns out, I was wrong. In the end, I asked one of my fellow employees how to use it. She gave me advice on how to post and get more followers, how to start conversations, what tags meant, etc. 


Once I was on twitter and rocking it, the entire universe expanded (although I still don't know how to schedule tweets...I'm still trying to learn that one..). 


I learned from Marilyn Almadovar, who I met on twitter, how to more efficiently utilize blogger. Did you know that you can schedule blog posts for the next day? Or a week later? Neither did I, so I asked and she taught me how to do this. (You go to post options, there's a little section that says "Schedule at:" I may or may not have been doing this all week.) 


From Janna Cawrse Esarey, I learned how to perfect my pitch which ended up getting me two agent partial requests. She hosted a panel at PNWA and stayed after, critiquing writer's pitches. But, in order to get help, I had to stop being afraid of her tearing me apart, and it turned out really well. (I made sure to find her by the end of the conference, buy her book, and thank her.)


A couple of months ago, I got an e-mail from a reader on the blog who saw that I'd written two novels in under 30 days, each. She asked if I had any tips on writing quickly, so my next blog post was about speed writing.  


Beyond that, if you just give a call out, "Hey I'm looking for a beta reader," sometimes people will respond. If not, what have you lost? Nothing, really.


Remember: It never hurts to ask, the worst a person can say is no. Most of us writers want to help out because we've all been there. (Just please, don't harass the agents or editors. It makes us all look bad...)

In other, unrelated news, I just finished an entire pack of Mint Oreo cookies in under 24 hours...more like 12 hours. Don't judge.

Reality Check II: Do Your Research

In my last blog, I talked about the financial costs of conferences, which may lead to a follow up question: 

How the heck do we find conferences in the first place??

First, you need to figure out what you're looking for out of conferences.
*Agents?
*Editors?
*Feedback?
*Networking?
*Finding new places to submit to?
etc

I've found that there are conferences that are specific to what genre you're writing in, so that's kind of a jumping point. My sister is the one who got me into AWP. Before that, I didn't even know about writing conferences.

Some conferences actually give you time slots to meet with agents. This one was PNWA.

~I found out about PNWA through Vickie Motter's blog. For those of you not familiar with her, she's an agent who is on twitter and keeps an advice/review blog. On her blog, she posts the conferences she'll be attending which is helpful to writers like me who hope to meet her, and pitch to her.

~I found out about LeakyCon's Lit Day from Jennifer Laughran's blog.

Moral of the story is: find the agents you're interested in. Follow them; their blogs, their twitter accounts. They will usually say something about upcoming conferences, or some, like Ms. Motter, will have where she'll be for the next year. It's an easy way to find out about conferences you wouldn't have otherwise known about. (From there you can decide which ones are feasible, and which ones are out of the question.)


The coolest thing about conferences is that writing is infectious. Literally, I'll be sitting in a panel and have a million new thoughts to write about. The backs of my notebooks are FILLED with random stuff to start; poems, stories, ways to edit existing stuff. And then when there's a break, hit the bookshop to find other authors and literary magazines. It's a great place to talk to editors, authors, etc.

Kinda blurry, sorry. This is Kerry Cohen speaking. She's amazing.

Beyond that, TALK TO EVERYONE. Literally, every chance you get, introduce yourself. Sit next to people. Become the social butterfly you've always wanted to be. You don't know who you'll bump into. Seriously, from one of my conferences, I met a woman who offered to house me for a night because I'd been driving an hour each morning to the conference, and an hour each evening. She and I will be roommates at this year's AWP. At the same conference, I also met another person who housed me in Florida during Lit Day.

So, make a good impression and if you're serious about the game:

HAVE YOUR PITCH READY.
Everyone will ask, "What's your novel about."
Make sure you have an answer.

Reality Check

Being a writer is a costly endeavor. First, there's the computer, the software. After you get there, there's the hours you devote a day to writing a novel, a story, whatever. If you're one of the rarities (that I'm not sure really exist) that manage to get published in their first shot, then you don't really need to listen to my rant. But even if you are, you may want to. Because even after you get published, it's still about getting your name out there and spreading your fan base.

So let's take a reality check here. Here are some costs of writing conferences and memberships that help boost your bio section of the query letter, help you network, and let you meet agents and editors:

SCBWI Winter Conference:
(Registration is still open to those of you who can afford it!)
Early Registration:   Members- $360
                                 NonMembers-$450
Regular Registration:  Members- $385
                                    Nonmembers-$485
SCBWI Membership:
1st Year: $85
Renewal Cost: $70

AWP Conference:
(This year it's in Chicago! See you there!)

Attendee Categories	Pre-registration Nov. 1 - Jan. 23	On-site Registration Feb. 29 - Mar. 3
Member	$155	$190
Non-member	$225	$265
Member + 1-Year AWP Membership	$220	$255
Student	$40	$60

I love this conference because of their student price. This is one of the only conferences I've found that offer this option. It is the first conference I was ever able to go to, and the one I will go to probably the rest of my life.

LeakyCon Lit Day:
(Also in Chicago this year. Woot!)
Okay, If you want Leaky Con it's $200. They don't have the price up for just the lit day portion yet.

PNWA Membership:

• $65 Regular Dues
• $25 Full-time Student

I did not know that these guys offered a student discount. I will have to pass this information along. Either way, I belong to this program because, although I live across the country, I saved close to $100 by being a member. Plus, like I previously stated, it's a nice thing to add to your query bio.

PNWA Conference:

They're posting the information, but if I remember correctly, it was like $300-$400. This conference to me rocked my work, and somehow I was able to afford it. 

But look at these costs. I'm a recent college graduate. I own a dog. I work a minimum wage job. Even if I'm able to afford the conferences, if I don't have friends who reside in the cities these things take place, that's an additional $200ish/per night, as well as the cost to get there (depending on location $400+). 

So, another reality check:

*My rent is $425/month

*Car payment is $300ish (somewhat flexible)/month

*Two credit cards: $200/month

*Baxter (without Vet visit): ~$40/month

*Food: Too much, though I tend to stick with Beefaroni, Raeman, and RiceaRoni

Those costs alone make me kind of want to...curl in the fetal position...like this:

In all fairness, this was taken after my first 2,000 ft tandem hang gliding flight

Bottom line: Money is a significantly limiting factor for me, what about you?

So some FREE advice because I like to ramble anyway:

Research the conferences. Find agents you would tear our your kidney and sell it on the black market for. Save up your money and go to those conferences. My college professor is the one who told me to go to AWP, and I am eternally thankful to her. Because of that conference, I started saving up money to go to more. I started writing again. 

If you have the money, they're so, so worth it. Not only for the agent-to-face time, but also for the panels, the authors, the networking, the free pens! 

It's a hard game. Money is just a piece we all play with, so play wisely.

Good luck!