Am I a Writer Yet?

In preparation for a conference I will be attending in a few weeks I have been talking to a lot of people. I don’t do well in crowds and it was suggested by my therapist- yes that kind of therapist- that I should take the time to meet people on the internet that will be attending this thing. This way it would be more like meeting up with friends rather than jumping into the coliseum with the word victim stamped on my forehead.

I made a few contacts and was pleased with the way things were going until I ran into someone who said that because I was not published I was not a real writer and she had nothing to say to me. I was a little shocked at her response but let it go as just another one of those internet harpies I obviously rubbed the wrong way. The upside to being dis’d was it did make me stop and ask myself: When am I officially a USDA inspected and approved writer?

Is it when your first piece shows up in print? Well...I wrote for the school newspaper in high school (student body population 960) so that would make me a writer since the late 70’s.

Is it when you sub something to a publisher for the first time? Hmmm…I submitted poetry to a few anthologies back in the early 80’s.

Is it when you put stuff on the internet to share with others in a public forum? Let’s see…I put my first blog up on my MySpace page in July 2008.

Or is it perhaps the moment you put pen/pencil to paper and wrote your first words of a piece. I’ve been writing since I was 12 and I’ll turn 48 on July 1^st. If that’s the case then I have been a writer for a VERY long time.

So what do you think? At what moment in time will you, or did you, consider yourself a real writer?

BITE ME

For the writers among you the concept of a muse is accepted. For the readers in the audience it may be a bit unsettling to hear writers talk about invisible people that only writers can see or hear. But after hanging around writers for awhile it becomes commonplace. A rather terse e-mail from a woman the other day regarding the ramblings on a list about my muse has prompted this blog. The woman, who I’ll call Agatha because I really can’t stand that name, is neither a writer or a reader of what I write. I know- that fact alone should have kept the e-mail from getting any further than the delete button. But being the open minded person I am I read the whole thing AND responded with a rather polite thank you. BUT it did give me something to blog about. So, Agatha, if you’re out there and reading this…..Kiss My A**. Yep. I said it and I meant it. For the rest of you, please read on.

Jaymes is my muse. I hired him from the temp service Fairy Godparents and Muses Inc. last May. He was hired to stand in for Delfyne, the muse I had since I turned 12 and she showed up in my bedroom in her Grecian outfit accompanied by her dog Ralph. Delfyne and I had a little misunderstanding about changing from writing Male/Female historical romance to strictly M/M in any subgenre. She took off for Vegas with Ralph and I found Jaymes. Again, for the writers out there this makes perfect sense. For the readers well…..not much I can say by way of explanation. This is how writer’s minds work and why we get the looks we get in the mall when we people watch. But back to Jaymes and the reason Agatha was madder then a wet hen when she e-mailed me.

Jaymes first and foremost is a construct. He has the looks of a model friend and the voice of a musician I happen to be in serious lust with. He has attitude issues, likes to think his word is law and like me is easily distracted by a good looking guy in a pair of very tight jeans. Oh yeah..Stonewashed 501’s really do the trick…….Ahem, back to Agatha. The reason Agatha was so upset, it seems, was because Jaymes, a product of MY overactive imagination and inability to keep my head out of men’s pants is portrayed as gay.

GASP! A GAY MUSE?!

No doubt. He gets all starry eyed whenever we talk about Jaime’s muse Timothy. And you can forget about getting any work done when AJ talks about John Barrowman. Jaymes just gets this glazed look in his eyes and walks out of my head for a few hours. Anyway, Agatha’s beef amounted to the rights of my muse to be straight. She said, in the span of a three page e-mail, I had no right to make him gay.

WHAT?? Are you effing kidding me?

He’s a figment of my imagination. I can make him yellow, pink or purple, from the planet Saturn, gay, straight, asexual or bi if I want to. I’ll say this again-he is a product of my imagination. Ah but there’s the problem she said. You created a being not unlike giving birth to a child and predisposing them to be of a particular sexual orientation is unjust.

HUH? WHAT?

I write about two guys having sex. Why in the world would I create a muse that is straight? And of course the follow up question would be Why are you messing around at a website that is advertised very clearly to be for a writer of GAY ROMANCE? And there in is the real reason I brought dear old misguided Agatha to this blog today. Being gay is not a choice any more than being straight is a choice. We are each hardwired at conception to be who we are. Railing at a gay man or woman about their sexual orientation is a waste of time. Telling me I have no right to envision Jaymes as gay is an even bigger waste of time. I have no clue why Jaymes sexual preference would bother someone but then again I have never understood the entire California gay pogo stick – we allow gay marriage, now we don’t – thing. Nuff said. I’ll blog about gay marriage and the idiots who oppose it another day.

So, in closing I have just one last thing to say to Agatha and any pinhead or dimwit out there who wants to stomp on my right to be gay and have a gay muse. I would ask you to please take another look at the disclaimer on the home page of my website after which I cordially invite you to BITE ME!

Size DOES Matter

My long suffering partner made a comment that has been running laps in my head for some time now. While helping me go thru a mountainous stack of WIP's he innocently opined "Why are all your main characters at least six feet tall? You have a problem with short guys?" Knowing that he had gone to the doctor for a physical recently and was told he had lost a quarter of an inch in height and was now officially five foot eleven and three quarters I just smiled and said "No. Not sure I ever noticed that fact before. Here, have another rice cake." Fact is .......I'm a snob. Yep...only had one BF in my entire life that was under six feet tall. It lasted exactly three months and was doomed from the start. And yeah I know all my main characters are tall. It's a pre-requisite. When I storyboard one of my pieces I look thru an extensive list of modeling and acting portfolios. If the guy isn't six foot or over-he doesn't even get a second look. Used to have a long list of other don'ts: no blondes, no tattoos, no piercings, no thongs, the list went on and on. Used to-that list is gone. Wrote a piece that has a blonde, tattooed, thonged and multi-pierced main character that my beta's are getting hard over, so that list has been banished. The six foot minimum stays tho. Sorry short guys-Trin, Ame, Lisa (yeah the other Lisa too) or Lex might have some work for you. I'll let them know you're available. LOL

I'm five seven. I'm a romantic. I love to cuddle. I love walking on the beach hand in hand, I love to.....well we won't go into that just yet....ahem. All the slots and tabs fit just right with a guy who's six foot or taller. Everything I want is eye level whether I'm standing or kne......uh.....laying on the bed beside him. And of course tall men have big hands and big feet which translates into big other things as well, at least according to old wive's tales. (Trust me.....those old ladies knew what they were talking about.)

Uh...where was I again? Oh yeah. Tall heroes. What other kind are there? I can't see a six foot four bad guy getting offed by a five nine stable boy. Do the math! The swords were close to four feet long. Big hands, big feet required to handle those things. Can you imagine my hero dragging his sword thru the mud......uhm.....the steel sword in the jeweled scabbard... (cough). And the love scenes? No offense to the real couples in the real world but I write romantic fantasies. If I can't live vicariously thru the characters I write then I just can't seem to write convincing dialog. Five eight alpha Ranulf telling six three Bryce he wants to ride him till the cows come home gives me a case of the giggles. My mind is doing a mental Tetris with their bodies. The Twister theme from my youth is ringing in my ears....gigglefest at full tilt.

In closing-just to make sure everyone is straight on the facts: Yes my heroes are all six feet tall or over, all with large hands and large feet so they can handle those big unwieldy swords of theirs and keep their partners healthy, happy and by their sides. Size does matter.......... that came out so wrong.........

Technically,Technically Challlenged

It's official-I have a blog.
I can't guarantee any words of wisdom or award winning prose but I will tell you what I'm thinking. What's on my mind. WTF I'm pissed about. And maybe even something relevant to writing. I get on the soapbox now and then. I have a bad habit of ranting and there's no way of knowing what I'll go off about. So bookmark me. You won't be disappointed. Might laugh your ass off, curse me to the high heavens or swear you'll never buy a single thing with my name on it but trust me - you won't be disappointed.
TTFN