a fool's musings

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Fool, said my muse to me,
look in thy heart and write...

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2002-06-26 - 11:02 p.m.

Han! Logan! Jesus! and a bikini!

The latest in the HanLoganverse is up in the LJ.

Still contemplating The Language of Goodbye. Maybe I will make it old age that does her in, since the question of cause of death seems to be the biggest one.

Hmm...

~victoria

[current mood: silly]
[current music: Moulin Rouge soundtrack]
[random quote: You think the world would have had enough of silly love songs, but I look around me and I see it isn't so]

~*~

2002-06-26 - 4:15 p.m.

the language of goodbye

Okay, that sound you hear is me eating crow, because after all my disdainful remarks about 2nd person POV, I've written a 2nd person POV ficlet.

I still think it's an annoying gimmick, but the story demanded it, and who am I to argue?

Anyhow, I'm not sure about it, so if anyone wants to drop me a line with helpful hints and suggestions, that'd be good.

I'm afraid it's all the things I hate about present tense as well as 2nd person.

Twee. Coy. Affected.

So, help a girl out, eh?

The Language of Goodbye

This is how it happens.

You meet a girl in a bar.

No.

You *see* a girl in a bar. You don't meet her until afterward, unless her saving your life can be counted as an introduction. Well, she didn't really save your life, but she didn't know it at the time, so you figure you can be generous, even if it's only in your own head.

Anyhow, you're not Emily Post, but you think that might count as an introduction, but maybe not.

You see her and you know she's looking at you, and that's no surprise. Women have been looking at you for as long as you can remember, and generally, they only want one thing.

And you're only too happy to give it to them in a blur of hair and scent and slick, wet heat; bruising hands and raking nails and the closest thing to heaven you can bring yourself to believe in, and it's over before you can savor it.

But this one is too young. Young and scared and fragile, and you shake yourself mentally, because you can't look at her that way, and you can't be who you are with her watching.

So when the asshole steps to you, you don't gut him, because somehow, what she thinks about you matters. The fact that she tried to help you, when no one tries to help you, when you don't even need the help, that means you have to live up to her expectations.

And she may be a young and dirty runaway, but she has, in those few seconds, shown you more humanity than you've experienced at the hands of others in a long time.

So you walk out and resolve to remember her big, liquid eyes, full of concern for you, some random mutant she's never met, and you resolve to be a better man. For the time it takes to walk to the trailer, anyway.

Then you remember, as if you could ever forget, what those fucking doctors did to you, and the thought of being a good man crumbles in the face of what you know you are.

But she won't leave you alone. You repay her by saving her -- once, twice, three times in the end, though the last two are simply you fixing up your own mistakes, so it's not like you've come to care.

No, because caring means being hurt, and you don't get hurt, you put the hurt on others. That's who -- what -- you are, and every time you try to forget *that*, life kicks you in the balls with a reminder.

You leave her -- the first goodbye.

She doesn't want you to go -- she even says as much, and you can kid yourself that you don't care, you can flirt with the redhead, but you know that this girl is more than a random fuck in a backwoods bar, so you make a silent promise to come back. You give her the only thing that matters; you give her your past as she gives you your future.

But you haven't figured it out. Not at this point. All that comes later.

You wonder for the next six months how this slip of a girl wrangled two promises out of you in as many days, when you hadn't made one in almost fifteen years.

You find yourself heading back to her, unconsciously drawn east by some invisible star only you can see.

So it goes for years. You've got all the time in the world. You're not growing old, and she's just becoming a woman, a beautiful, caring woman who will always remain for you, at some deep level, the girl who cared enough about a random stranger to save his life.

Because now you can look back on it and see so clearly how she is there at every crossroads, every turning point in your life. Each decision you made after she sneaked into your trailer (and into your heart, though you wouldn't put it quite that way, even if it does sound like the country songs you spend so much time listening to on the road) has been affected by her presence and each decision from now on will be affected by her absence.

You come and go, each time leaving a bit more of yourself in her small, gloved hands, bits and pieces that make you who you are, and a time comes when you can't imagine who you'd be without her -- the man in the bar, lost and lonely, full of hurt and willing to share only that with other people.

You've got all the time in the world, and you forget that she doesn't, that she'll grow old and die before you turn around twice, it seems, except that, in the business you're in, growing old is seldom in the game plan.

You watch over her, heal her when she needs it.

One day you even manage to work up that famed courage enough to tell her out loud, in words, how you feel.

She smiles and the world stops for a moment; your heart beats in time with the soft whisper of her breath as she says, "Yes." And "I love you."

You touch her gently and you learn all the lessons of her body; she teaches you about yours. You never knew it was possible to feel both joy and dread, and each day is a mixture of them because each day you live with the fear that she will somehow realize that you are that man in that bar, lost and lonely and full of hurt. But she doesn't. She still sees something more, and you love her for that in addition to everything else, you love her so much you feel like there's no room for anyone or anything else, and yet there always is.

Once she opened the door, you suddenly find yourself up to your neck in people to care about, and you find they have a way of sneaking in, much as she did, and caring back.

And amidst all that caring, you forgot the most important thing, the one lesson life has taught you again and again.

You are nothing, and no one, and not worthy of all the good things she's given you, so of course, they must be taken away.

Home and freedom, safety and peace are the first to go. A life on the run is nothing new for you, but you wanted better for her. She seems happy just to be with you, but you can see the lines of care etching themselves into her skin, even as you touch her at night, while she's sleeping, trying to heal the woes that goes beyond the merely physical.

But the physical is your realm, you know it better than most, and you keep her with you for a long time, longer than even you expected, when you come right down to it.

You know she's not the type to run from a little trouble (or a lot of trouble, if you're honest about it, and a liar is the one thing you've never been), but part of you is always waiting for that other shoe to drop, for her to realize that there must be something, some*one* better for her out there.

But she doesn't leave you.

No. Not yet.

Friends fall, some in battle, some from illness, and still she stays.

Until now.

It is her turn to leave, and your turn to say, "I don't want you to go."

But you know it makes no difference, because you can't save her, can't reach her, can't force her to stay.

She smiles, and it's never lost its affect on you. The world still stops, and your heart still beats in time with her ragged breathing.

"I love you," she says, and you kiss her, trying to force the healing into her, but she's so weak that all she gets is your fear and desperation. Her tears fall like rain, even as she smiles and you strip off her gloves and kiss her hands tenderly, safely.

"I love you," you say, "don't leave me."

She strokes your face with a bare hand, and you can tell from her heavy-lidded gaze and the rasp of her breath that she'll be gone in but a moment.

Her time has run out, and you've got nothing but time. You get the irony, but don't find it funny.

You've spent the past ten years learning the language of love.

But in these final, fleeting moments, you speak the language of goodbye.

You speak of her to strangers in bars, on cold, lonely nights spent hunched over a bottle of scotch.

This is how it happens, you say. You meet a girl in a bar, and your entire life is turned upside down.

In the telling, you can almost feel her touch, you remember all she taught you, all you've learned, and you wouldn't change a moment, but for the end, the one thing you wish you'd left unlearned.

You can never forget the language of goodbye.

end

~*~

As always, suggestions are welcome.

~victoria

link

[current mood: anxiously creative]
[current music: Love in an Elevator - Aerosmith]
[random quote: \"Heart has nothing to do with it anymore. It's all in the caffeine.\" Frank Pembleton, HLotS]

~*~

2002-06-26 - 1:33 p.m.

insularity, community, fandom

In response to my entry on my own experience as a beginning writer in XMMFF, Minisinoo wrote:
The reason I gave the example and asked the question was to try to find out what went WRONG. It's not about her. It's about 'us.' Quoting H. Richard Niebuhr, "To see ourselves as others see us, to have others communicate to us what they see when they regard our lives from the outside is to have a moral experience." Sometimes it's complimentary, sometimes it's a bit surprising and painful. So my question is why a perception was received that I doubt was ever meant to be communicated? Some are inclined to say, "Well, it's her problem. I'm not here to take care of others, just me." Seems a short-sighted view, if we're interested in maintaining the health of a fandom -- which is really what the question is about. Fandom IS a community, and communities can be characters as "more open" or "less open." Sociologically speaking, the more open communities are those that change and grow (and remain healthy). Closed or more closed communities begin to shrink, asphixiate, and die. So if we wish to acquire and maintain new writers, be seen as "open," we need to look at the failures and figure out what happened ... so we can learn and perhaps fix it.

That's really what my example was all about. It's a "moral experience" for movieverse. Now, what do we learn from it? Proactive response, not defensive. As noted, I'm not interested in defenses right now. There's been plenty of that running around. I'm interested in coming up with new ideas that are positive. :)

This is my response to her (also available in the comments of my LJ, but I figured this was a good place for it too, since it was in response to a diary entry):

*shrug*

Your post made me think about my own experience with XMMFF and I decided to relate it as a comparison.

I chose to keep writing despite the lack of *overwhelming* response because I had stories to tell regardless of whether they were the stories others wanted to read.

I understand that it's painful not to get feedback, and painful to feel as though you don't fit in, but we can't make people feedback fic they don't like or don't read or aren't interested in.

I mean, sure, you (generic) could stipulate that on X list, each member must send three pieces of public feedback/crit weekly or they can't be a member, and maybe that'd work.

But you (still generic) can't force people to welcome someone into the community, and you can't really regulate how a community operates, beyond common courtesy and netiquette and the rules of the FAQ (i.e., fic-only, discussion-only, no OT, OT is fine, no attachments, no meta, etc. etc.).

I think there's merit to the idea of "fanotypes," (who coined it? Anyone remember?) that certain fandoms attract certain types of people, and some fandoms are not going to be a good fit for some authors.

I can tell from my personal experience that Homicide fandom - discussion only as I wasn't involved in the fic end, but just alt.tv.homicide - was no place for the faint of heart or people who wanted to be hand-held or made much of.

I'm sure there are fandoms that are the opposite, that gush and coddle newbies, and make everybody feel at home right away.

With XMMFF, and L/R in particular, I think that there was a circling the wagons mentality among the early writers, due to the hostility movieverse seems to have encountered in general - and I know Logan/Rogue did in particular, so it may not have been the most welcoming place.

My experience says that it was, but again, I didn't get reams of feedback, I just got enough to keep me going.

The other thing to keep in mind is the outsider status many fans and fic-writers cling to.

We are geeks and nerds etc. and we were, many of us, unpopular, unhappy and on the fringes for most of our lives, so we are going to respond in a way that is consistent with that experience, *even if* there is no true "cool club" or clique barring our way from being popular.

I don't know that there are any solutions to insularity.

Yes, mentoring can work - with veterans being paired with newbies to groom them. However, unless there's a tradition of this, or the veterans take it up on themselves to do so, there's no way to *make* it happen.

Some writers are more successful at it than others (see Te); I haven't been. I can think of a handful of people I wrote to enthusiastically when they arrived on the L/R scene, for whom I offered to beta, and when I did so, never ever heard from them again, nor did they post.

So I don't know what the answer is, if there even is one, beyond that you get what you give in fandom, and sometimes not even that.

The people who reach out and send feedback are probably the ones who get it the most. The people who were warmly welcomed when they were newbies tend to be the kindest towards newbies later on.

I don't think there's any solution other than what we learned in kindergarten:

"Share everything. Play fair. Don't hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don't take things that aren't yours. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat."

~*~

On a similar but not really note, some more in the discussion on quality and judgement and objective standards in writing.

Woohoo!

Other people doing the heavy lifting for me!

Read FayJay, who started this round of the discussion, Allison (hee! a fellow Limbonian!) in response to Fay, and then Jen_K on both Fay and Allison.

Lovely stuff I mostly agree with.

It's nice to just read along and nod my head in agreement. *g*

Got something to say?

~victoria

link

[current mood: thoughtful]
[current music: silence]
[random quote: I hit him with that bat to show him I understand his pain. I hit him with that bat to show him that I love him.]

~*~

2002-06-25 - 10:40 p.m.

for want of a nail...

for want of a nail the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the rider was lost. ~Ben Franklin

On my trip home tonight, I read the notary book again, and took one of the sample tests. I came home. I sorted laundry. I took the notary materials with me and as I waited for the wash, I read through everything; took another sample test. Class E felony = 4 years in prison; Class D felony = 7 years in prison. Cannot charge a public official for an oath. A notary is a public official. A notary cannot give legal advice. Yada yada, blah bliddy blah blah.

Came to the back of the book, checked the address I need to go to tomorrow to take the test.

Read the test prep instructions.

And 5 little words (4 words and a number actually) stared back at me -- 5 words (4 words and a number) that may just scuttle the whole shebang:

Bring two number 2 pencils.

I don't have any #2 pencils here at home. I could have brought boxes of 'em home from work if I'd remembered, but NO!

I just tore my apartment apart looking for pencils. I found one, that has no point and a bad eraser.

I am so pathetic.

So now I have to scramble tomorrow to buy pencils - *and* a sharpener- before the test.

Thank god there's a Staples on Vesey Street, across from J&R, or I'd be totally scrod.

~*~

In happier news, Devil Doll is a goddess.

Go look!

~*~

In less Nekkid!Hugh news, In Their Own Words has (finally!) been updated. This edition features the lovely and talented Marguerite, well-known in both West Wing and X-Files fandom.

Go read!

~*~

And a third pimping, Easter Egg Vinegar In Your Eye has been updated, with an article about why we write the fic we write, and why we write fanfic in general.

Go. Read. Now.

~victoria

PS: Please respect DD's wishes and do not lick her journal. Thank you. The Management.

link



[current mood: horny, and anxious - a bad combo]
[current music: Someday I'll Fly Away - Nicole Kidman]
[random quote: see Ben, above. *g*]

~*~

2002-06-25 - 2:45 p.m.

Good links

Good stuff in blogland today:

FayJay on quality in fanfic. In the comments, I think I can whole-heartedly endorse what lolalaland says.

And on the Buffy front, Viridian5 tackles the Spike question.

Redemptionista v. evilista is too reductive, she says, and I agree.

Go read!

~victoria

link

[current mood: headachy]
[current music: Someday I'll Fly Away - Nicole Kidman]
[random quote: when will love be done with me?]

~*~

2002-06-25 - 11:33 a.m.

the little shipper that could

Been thinking.

A dangerous pastime, I know. (God, I love that quote.)

In the comments of Andraste's journal, Min writes:
There was a writer of movieverse (who shall remain nameless) who started out writing S/J, but got little or no feedback (I think I was the only person feedbacking her at all at one point). I kept telling her to stick around, keep plugging at it, so she did. She looked around at the fandom, saw that R/L was the dominant pairing and decided to try a little of that: marketing strategy, I guess. Well, she got almost no feedback for her R/L, either! And it wasn't that she was a bad writer. She wasn't outSTANDING, perhaps, but she was far from the worst. So why no feedback? Unfortunately, she finally gave up and walked away from the fandom, and said bitterly to me, "It's just a little clique! They don't really want any new writers, whatever they say!" Ouch. I seriously doubt any movieverse authors (R/L or otherwise) meant to send a message of that sort, but it happened for at least one person. So we have to ask ourselves, What went wrong? How did someone who wanted to write, and who kept at it for more than one or two stories, and was a perfectly decent writer, get such an OVERWHELMINGLY negative perception of the fandom as closed and cliquish?

I don't know how that happened, but I have a few things to say in response.

Regardless of how diplomatic I try to be on this, I'm going to come off rude or snide, and that's not how it's intended, so I'll just be blunt and hope everyone takes it in the spirit intended.

Also, everything I'm going to say is based on my experience in XMMFF.

To repeat, in boldface, this has been MY experience, and well, I'm extrapolating from that, as well as from my own attitude on things.

As I've discussed ad nauseum, I write because I need to. I have to. I have stories demanding airtime in my head, and they want to come out and be heard. Occasionally, I have characters who chatter at me until I sit down and write, because that's the only way I can shut them up.

So the idea that one can switch pairings based on popularity or marketing or amounts of feedback baffles me.

In addition to the overwhelming amount of L/R I've produced, I've written S/J. I've written Ororo/Gambit. I've written Logan/Scott and Bobby/Kitty and Scott/Rogue and (if I ever get around to it), I'll write Logan/Ororo. I've done so because each time, that particular story demanded that particular pairing. And because for the most part, I like those pairings.

So to me, the whole notion that one comes to a fandom (any fandom - and I'll use other examples in a minute) as a writer of an "unpopular" pairing and can just switch based on the fact that well, "everyone" likes something else... I don't get it.

I mean, if I didn't see Clark/Lex sparkage, I wouldn't bother to write or read the fic (and well, over in the LJ, you can read about my realization about Smallville fic if you're interested). Same goes for every other pairing.

That strikes me as the dreaded "writing for feedback."

Yes, it's lovely and addictive to get feedback. Yes, I'm envious of those people whose feedback counts regularly hits the double digits.

But if someone is discouraged enough to stop writing or to change what they write (not quality-wise, but content-wise) simply because of a lack of feedback or a perceived notion that "X gets feedback, so if I write X, I, too, will get feedback", then I'd posit, based on my own experience and feelings about writing, that that person wasn't really interested in the writing at all. Or at least not as much as the validation that writing can bring.

Because let's face it. If I'd let the amount of feedback I received for such early stories as Lost and Found, Night Visits and The Girl of His Dreams discourage me, I'd never have written any smut or any angst or any gen ever again. (And yes, some of you are cursing mightily now. Nyah. *g* It takes more than passive (or even active, ;)) *dis*couragement to get rid of this pest. I'm a little sister. I know from perseverance.)

I'd have finished off Devil's in the Dreaming, because Achin' to Be got good feedback, and been done with the whole thing.

Because let me tell you, a Homicide/X-Men crossover (Lost and Found) has almost no audience (though I did get an email from someone I really like and respect, and that made me so happy that I didn't really *care* that almost no one else read or liked the story). And these three stories are the first ones I wrote that moved beyond the little Achin' to Be universe I'd set up that was so successful.

And I think I got in the area of 1-3 feedback emails for each story. Feel Me Don't You was another winner in the feedback stakes, and if that got more than 2, I don't recall it.

And this is yes, from both the old WaR and from XMMFF.

So if ever there were a writer set up for discouragement, a writer *already* working in "the pairing that ate the fandom", 'twas I.

Yet I didn't give up.

I haven't given up in Smallville (though, as I've said, I'm far less driven to write SV fic, though last night and this morning, well, Clark is doing some ruminating on the line "The time between meeting and finally leaving is sometimes called falling in love." I blame Lisa Loeb. And I guarantee nothing. *g*), but I am *far* below the apparent fandom average of 7-8 feedbacks per story.

Two of my stories have garnered a lot of feedback, which would bump my average up, but the rest? Not so much.

And the thing is, that's okay.

Because I wrote the stories I needed to write. And for the most part, with one or two exceptions, I'm happy with the stories I've written.

I have luckily never been faced with a complete and total lack of feedback, though one or two stories have come close (as in feedback = 2 emails).

I wonder if part of my own stick-to-itiveness is based on the fact that I have a very supportive circle of betas, as well as friends who pet me when I get into a snit about these things, even though they don't necessarily send feedback, or even *read* everything I've written. They've read enough to feel comfortable assuring me that the story itself is good and it's not anything but timing or something that precludes the avalanche of feedback they know is waiting around the corner.

Which, you know, happened for a couple of stories a long time ago, and it's a heady feeling and I can totally see wanting to continue to ride that wave. Most of that "extra" feedback was from stories posted in parts, and I can see why people do that. I can see why people hold their audience hostage with a TBC at the end and then a day or two between chapters, because people will write and literally *beg* you to finish the fic.

And who doesn't like begging and pleading? *g*

But the thing is, yes, there was a clique in XMMFF - there were a few of 'em, I'd venture to guess. I'm not going to rehash that discussion.

People hang out with people they like. Hence, a clique is formed. It has nothing to do with *you* (generic) and everything to do with *them*, and getting your knickers in a twist about it is fruitless. No fruit for you.

Not everyone is going to like you, and even all the people who *do* like you aren't going to rush to be your new best friend. And personally, I'm always suspicious of anyone who does. But that's just me.

I understand that fanfic is a hobby and people want to enjoy it, and getting feedback and the admiration of one's peers is definitely a huge part of that. And if you don't get it, and other people do and lots of it (some of whom, in your opinion, probably don't even *deserve* it), while your stories languish on the vine, unloved, I can see getting discouraged and quitting.

And there's nothing wrong with that.

But I don't think that people who write because of a need inside stop writing. They just find a more conducive outlet for it. That could be another list, starting your own list, or, I guess, moving on to another fandom, though as I've said, if I'm obsessed enough with a pairing or a fandom to write fic for it, I can't imagine leaving simply because I don't get the feedback. Simply because I haven't. I didn't.

Obviously, mileage varies.

And I'm not trying to put down or belittle the person Min was referring to. I'm just saying, in my experience, I don't get it.

Osservazioni?.

~victoria

link

[current mood: perky]
[current music: The Rising - Bruce - New Bruce!! Woohoo!]
[random quote: \"Lefou, I'm afraid I've been thinking.\" \"A dangerous pastime.\" \"I know.\"]

~*~

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The painting is "Boreas" by John William Waterhouse. Again, not a muse, but I like her. She suits the color scheme.

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